Tag: August

This video courtesy of the BP live webcam addicts at the Oil Drum.  http://www.theoildrum.com/node…

When we last left our ongoing story of why The Brightest Minds in Govt. Science were giving BP permission to keep  ****ing around playing with their broken oil well, instead of completing the Bottom Kill cementing, BP was observed to be moving Giant Tools towards the Macondo 252 Deepwater Horizon oil well again, then Adm. Allen had to give out matching narrative after a few news cycles as to what the fooking h*ll they were really doing.

We’ll do the bottom kill when we’re ready, Harry.  – Adm. Thad “Patton” Allen  

They wanted to look inside the old BOP, and go fishing and pull the old drill pipe out of the well bore. Bottom kill, schmottom kill, the Lawyers need evidence to sue each other for the next 2 decades.

So far, they took the very top lid off the new BOP and Stacking Ram they mounted on the old one,  and peered inside, and noticed that the brand new BOP and 3 blade Stacking Ram had 1 Shear Ram that was stuck in a half open, half shut position so they couldn’t get down and look into the other parts.

Yes, their brand new BOP toy wasn’t working already.

Okay.  No problemo.  Just spend a week trying to jimmy the the thing open again.  

Because the Original is always so much better than anything I could ever hope to make up:

The Further Adventures of Macondo 252, Oil Well of Doom

Hit the theme music:

If I had to do the same again, I would, my friend, Fernando !  

Remember this, back in June on the 23rd ?

Uncapped BP Well before installation of new blow out protector assembly.

And then in July, they finally got a new spool, cap n stack and a spankin’ new Blow Out Protector on the thing to cap the well and shut it off almost 3 months after it blew ?  And everybody went Halleleujah ?

You are so going to love this.  Another in the series, Macondo, Oil Well of Doom.

I have wrestled an image from the balko puter onto photomucket.  Look what I found on the BP webcams this evening.

What the bleep is this on Rov Enterprise 2 cam  Tues evening Aug 17th ?

Check the official BP twitter feed.  http://twitter.com/BP_America    

As part of a #BP tourism grant, Gulf resort giving free night’s stay and $250 gift card: http://bit.ly/bV9XKC

about 4 hours ago via HootSuite

Retweeted by 5 people

BP_America

http://twitter.com/BP_America/…

That’s not a Motel 6.  WTF.    

Well, sorta.  I’m not Harry Kemelman and this isn’t Barnard’s Crossing.    And it’s not 1964, though on some levels it feels like it.  I mean: there are a zillion right wing nutjobs trying to repeal the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution and deport 15 million people, and somehow those terrible ideas aren’t even being greeted with even the vituperation Barry Goldwater got when he suggested carpet bombing Vietnam back into the stone age (as if that were possible without killing everyone on Earth).  On the vituperate scale, Barry G got a 6.  The current mischagas gets about a 4.  Or less.  What I’m talking about is a country gone insane.  Just like 1964.

I know.  It’s hot.  Very hot.  When it’s August, all of the psychiatrists go to Martha’s Vineyard for the month, leaving behind voicemails that tell their distraught clientele to go to the emergency room if they need to.  If I were having cocktails right now in Chilmark, and I hasten to say that I’m not, I’d probably think that such a message was a good idea too.  But it’s not.  It doesn’t take into consideration the overwhelming, gigantic epidemic of mental disease and delusion now festering in America in the form of amnesiac tea baggers, Glenn Beck devotees,  birthers, racists, kooks of all stripes,  dittoheads and a Republican Congress that for all its orange skin and blow dried hair should have its own chapter in the DSM IV.  Yes, I know.  These loons don’t have shrinks who are on vacation in Martha’s Vineyard.  Correct.  The people whose shrinks are in Martha’s Vineyard, people like me, living in New York and Boston, are in far worse condition: they’re sweltering in an apartment that cannot make it cooler than 80 degrees, the air is awful, and the only thing on the tube is the constant, annoying blathering of people so deranged that they throw even those like me, those with minor, urban, post information age neuroses into serious crisis.  You could take me for an example.

Let’s look at one thing, ok?  I heard today that the oil from the BP spill is all but disappeared and that soon Louisiana fisherman are going to start fishing and shrimping again.  Because, allegedly, that’s now safe and we all believe the Government and the pants-on-fire team at BP about that.  It’s safe?  I’ll believe it when I see BP’s executives eating oysters off the halfshell. Till then,  I’m sorry,  I can’t accept that.  Oil and all that Corexit, all gone now?  Nonsense.  In fact, these stories enrage me.  They are, to me, like tickling dynamite with a blowtorch.  If I had a shrink, I’d be speed dialing already.  “Help me,” I’d whimper, grasping the Blackberry in icy, flinching hands, “The most violent, greedy, despicable inmates have taken over the asylum.  And I need your help to deal with it.”

I know Obama and the Democrats were supposed to be able to play 11-dimensional chess when they took over.  Right now, I’m wondering whether they can even play checkers.  It’s too hot to be charitable, and the neighbors, that is, the other occupants of this country, are becoming louder and more deranged every day.  The summer heat is making the country even more insane.

Maybe what I need is a cocktail and a new outgoing message.

simulposted at The Dream Antilles and dailyKos

This week in Trickle Down Oilonomics:

First, remember this ?

  Screen shot from June 1, 2010 of ROVs cutting the old riser pipe off the old top of the BOP, showing the underwater plume.

Two months later:

Tues,  Aug 3, 2010,  BP pumped drilling mud into the capped Macondo 252 Deepwater Horizon well from the top.

http://www.bp.com/genericartic…

BP announces Static pressure stabilization from  Mud Pump into well a success on Wed Aug 4th.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/n…

Federal Government and NOAA’s Lubchenco & team of expert scientists announce rest of oil in Gulf of Mexico is naturally biodegrading. Oil is disappeared !    As of Wed, Aug 4th.  https://www.docudharma.com/diar…

From Plume to Pie Chart, 6/1/2010 to 8/4/2010.  In Amerika, Oil Spill Cleans You !  

Except that 650 miles of shoreline in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Florida remained oiled, and 57,539 square miles, or 24% of the Gulf of Mexico, is closed to fishing, per their own press release.  http://ht.ly/2loZg

BPravda Today

Macno Nc4e3aet !

Wednesday, August 4, 2010

Because the original documents are always so much better than anything I could hope to make up:

http://ht.ly/2kWkj

August 4, 2010, Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill Response, Deepwater Horizon Incident Joint Information Center

Federal Science Report Details Fate of Oil from BP Spill

WASHINGTON – The vast majority of the oil from the BP oil spill has either evaporated or been burned, skimmed, recovered from the wellhead or dispersed using chemicals –  much of which is in the process of being degraded. Much of this is the direct result of the federal response efforts.

A third (33 percent) of the total amount of oil released in the Deepwater Horizon/BP spill was captured or mitigated by the Unified Command recovery operations, including burning, skimming, chemical dispersion and direct recovery from the wellhead, according to a federal science report released today.

An additional 25 percent of the total oil naturally evaporated or dissolved, and 16 percent was dispersed naturally into microscopic droplets.  The residual amount, just over one quarter (26 percent), is either on or just below the surface as residue and weathered tarballs, has washed ashore or been collected from the shore, or is buried in sand and sediments.  Dispersed and residual oil remain in the system until they degrade through a number of natural processes.  Early indications are that the oil is degrading quickly.

These estimates were derived by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the Department of the Interior (DOI), who jointly developed what’s known as an Oil Budget Calculator, to provide measurements and best estimates of what happened to the spilled oil.   The calculator is based on 4.9 million barrels of oil released into the Gulf, the government’s Flow Rate Technical Group estimate from Monday. More than 25 of the best government and independent scientists contributed to or reviewed the calculator and its calculation methods.

“Teams of scientists and experts have been carefully tracking the oil since day one of this spill, and based on the data from those efforts and their collective expertise, they have been able to provide these useful and educated estimates about the fate of the oil,” says Jane Lubchenco, under secretary of commerce for oceans and atmosphere and NOAA administrator.  “Less oil on the surface does not mean that there isn’t oil still in the water column or that our beaches and marshes aren’t still at risk.  Knowing generally what happened to the oil helps us better understand areas of risk and likely impacts.”

The estimates do not make conclusions about the long-term impacts of oil on the Gulf.  Fully understanding the damages and impacts of the spill on the Gulf of Mexico ecosystem is something that will take time and continued monitoring and research.

Dispersion increases the likelihood that the oil will be biodegraded, both in the water column and at the surface.  While there is more analysis to be done to quantify the rate of biodegradation in the Gulf, early observations and preliminary research results from a number of scientists show that the oil from the BP Deepwater Horizon spill is biodegrading quickly.  Scientists from NOAA, EPA, DOE, and academic scientists are working to calculate more precise estimates of this rate.

It is well known that bacteria that break down the dispersed and weathered surface oil are abundant in the Gulf of Mexico in large part because of the warm water, the favorable nutrient and oxygen levels, and the fact that oil enters the Gulf of Mexico through natural seeps regularly.

Residual oil is also degraded and weathered by a number of physical and biological processes.  Microbes consume the oil, and wave action, sun, currents and continued evaporation and dissolution continue to break down the residual oil in the water and on shorelines.

The oil budget calculations are based on direct measurements wherever possible and the best available scientific estimates where measurements were not possible.  The numbers for direct recovery and burns were measured directly and reported in daily operational reports.  The skimming numbers were also based on daily reported estimates.  The rest of the numbers were based on previous scientific analyses, best available information and a broad range of scientific expertise.  These estimates will continue to be refined as additional information becomes available.

7/9/2010 Gulf of Mexico  6 days before the leaking well was capped. photo NASA

67% of this is going to go away all by itself, naturally, according to the finest scientific minds available. Image from NOAA and the Deepwater Horizon Incident Joint Information Center.