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© New Scientist
Can't believe that the wretched Deepwater Horizon oil pipe is still leaking? Now there's a way to check for yourself.

BP has set up a live video feed of the biggest leak, which is available online 24/7.

The video shows oil spewing from the end of the riser pipe, the larger of two leak points on the seafloor. This pipe initially ran vertically from the blowout preventer on the sea bed right up to the surface but collapsed when the surface fire was put out. The graphic below (available as a pdf) illustrates the setup.

The riser insertion tube, which has been jammed into the riser pipe and is currently capturing roughly 2000 barrels of oil a day, is hidden by the spewing oil in the video.

The live stream should make interesting viewing tomorrow, 27 May, as BP attempts a "top kill" by pumping heavy mud into the blowout preventer to try to stop the flow entirely.

Videos like this can help calculate the amount of oil that is being vomited into the Gulf of Mexico. BP initially released a short video clip of the spill which independent scientists used to estimate that the flow rate was up to 20 times higher than the official figure - itself based on how much oil could be seen on the surface.

Federal agencies, led by the US Geological Survey, have since set up a Flow Rate Technical Group tasked with coming up with a more precise figure. It was due to report early this week but the figure has yet to be released.