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Methane Eruption Warned May Kill Gulf of Mexico

Matthew Brown and Ramit Plushnick-Masti
The European Union Times
Sat, 19 Jun 2010 11:00 UTC
oil spill
© AP Photo/Gerald Herbert
The oil damaged shoreline in the Northern reaches of Barataria Bay is seen amidst work boats in oil polluted waters as Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal's tours oil damage in Barataria Bay, La., Thursday, June 17, 2010.
New Orleans - It is an overlooked danger in oil spill crisis: The crude gushing from the well contains vast amounts of natural gas that could pose a serious threat to the Gulf of Mexico's fragile ecosystem.

The oil emanating from the seafloor contains about 40 percent methane, compared with about 5 percent found in typical oil deposits, said John Kessler, a Texas A&M University oceanographer who is studying the impact of methane from the spill.

That means huge quantities of methane have entered the Gulf, scientists say, potentially suffocating marine life and creating "dead zones" where oxygen is so depleted that nothing lives.

"This is the most vigorous methane eruption in modern human history," Kessler said.
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Wolf

Despicable Cruelty! BP "Burning Sea Turtles Alive"

Danile Tencer
Raw Story
Sun, 20 Jun 2010 15:16 UTC
Image
© AP Photo
A sea turtle caught up in the oil spill waits for treatment.
A rare and endangered species of sea turtle is being burned alive in BP's controlled burns of the oil swirling around the Gulf of Mexico, and a boat captain tasked with saving them says the company has blocked rescue efforts.

Mike Ellis, a boat captain involved in a three-week effort to rescue as many sea turtles from unfolding disaster as possible, says BP effectively shut down the operation by preventing boats from coming out to rescue the turtles.

"They ran us out of there and then they shut us down, they would not let us get back in there," Ellis said in an interview with conservation biologist Catherine Craig.

Part of BP's efforts to contain the oil spill are controlled burns. Fire-resistant booms are used to corral an area of oil, then the area within the boom is lit on fire, burning off the oil and whatever marine life may have been inside.

"Once the turtles get in there they can't get out," Ellis said.
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Nuke

Nuclear and Toxic Waste in the Mediterranean Sea

Kurt Sansone
Times of Malta
Sun, 20 Sep 2009 09:23 UTC
An Italian mafia turncoat testifying about the dumping of nuclear and toxic waste in the Mediterranean Sea said that Malta was one of three countries where the criminal organisation deposited money coming from illegal operations.

A former member of the Calabrian Mafia (ndrangheta), Francesco Fonti admitted in front of an Italian judge that the criminal organisation had sunk ships carrying nuclear and toxic waste in the Mediterranean Sea in the 1980s and 1990s.

The accusations are not new but in the past judges had always archived suspect cases because no proof was ever provided of the sunken ships. However, this changed last Saturday when a submersible robot discovered the wreck of a ship that went down in 1992 with 120 drums of toxic waste. The drums were also visible at a depth of 487 metres.
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Cloud Lightning

Toxins From Oil Spill? Mystery Crop Damage Threatens Hundreds Of Acres


YouTube/WREG
Mon, 07 Jun 2010 18:40 UTC
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Family

Video: Gulf Fisherman: We Need Help -"It's Heartbreaking "


YouTube
Sat, 19 Jun 2010 18:16 UTC
Dwayne Price, a charter boat fisherman, gave the AP's Bonny Ghosh a tour of oil-soaked Barataria Bay in Louisiana. Price decried the impact of the oil spill on the areas wildlife and pleaded for more help cleaning it up.

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Hourglass

Gulf oil spill: A hole in the world

Naomi Klein
The Guardian
Sat, 19 Jun 2010 12:04 UTC
oil soaked pelicans
© Lee Celano/Reuters
‘Obama cannot order pelicans not to die (no matter whose ass he kicks). And no amount of money – not BP’s $20bn, not $100bn – can replace a culture that’s lost its roots.’
The Deepwater Horizon disaster is not just an industrial accident - it is a violent wound inflicted on the Earth itself. In this special report from the Gulf coast, a leading author and activist shows how it lays bare the hubris at the heart of capitalism

Everyone gathered for the town hall meeting had been repeatedly instructed to show civility to the gentlemen from BP and the federal government. These fine folks had made time in their busy schedules to come to a high school gymnasium on a Tuesday night in Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana, one of many coastal communities where brown poison was slithering through the marshes, part of what has come to be described as the largest environmental disaster in US history.

"Speak to others the way you would want to be spoken to," the chair of the meeting pleaded one last time before opening the floor for questions. And for a while the crowd, mostly made up of fishing families, showed remarkable restraint. They listened patiently to Larry Thomas, a genial BP public relations flack, as he told them that he was committed to "doing better" to process their claims for lost revenue - then passed all the details off to a markedly less friendly subcontractor. They heard out the suit from the Environmental Protection Agency as he informed them that, contrary to what they have read about the lack of testing and the product being banned in Britain, the chemical dispersant being sprayed on the oil in massive quantities was really perfectly safe.

But patience started running out by the third time Ed Stanton, a coast guard captain, took to the podium to reassure them that "the coast guard intends to make sure that BP cleans it up".
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Radar

Egypt oil spill threatens Red Sea marine life


Agence France-Presse
Sun, 20 Jun 2010 14:54 UTC
Image
© Agence France-Presse/file
A sea turtle swims with scuba divers in the Ras Mohammed protection area near Sharm el-Sheikh in Egypt. …
Cairo - An oil spill off the Egyptian Red Sea coast of Hurghada threatening to damage marine life in the area has prompted environmental agencies to demand tighter regulation of offshore oil platforms.

Large quantities of oil have appeared in recent days around the resorts of Hurghada which draw millions of tourists who come to dive or snorkle, according to the Hurghada Environmental Protection and Conservation Agency.

"It started four or five days ago and the companies responsible didn't notify anyone. It is catastrophic," HEPCA Managing Director Amr Ali told AFP.

The spill was caused by leakage from an offshore oil platform north of Hurghada and has polluted protected areas and showed up on tourist beach resorts.
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Eye 2

As oil spews in Gulf, BP chief at U.K. yacht race

Raphael Satter
Associated Press
Sat, 19 Jun 2010 13:07 UTC
BP Chief Executive Tony Hayward
© Win McNamee / Getty Images
BP Chief Executive Tony Hayward
New Orleans -- BP chief executive Tony Hayward, often criticized for being tone-deaf to American concerns about the worst oil spill in U.S. history, took time off today to attend a glitzy yacht race off England's Isle of Wight.

Spokeswoman Sheila Williams said Hayward took a break from overseeing BP efforts to stem the undersea gusher in Gulf of Mexico to watch his boat "Bob" participate in the J.P. Morgan Asset Management Round the Island Race.

The one-day yacht race is one of the world's largest, attracting hundreds of boats and thousands of sailors.

In a statement, BP described Hayward's break as "a rare moment of private time" and said that "no matter where he is, he is always in touch with what is happening within BP" and can direct recovery operations if required.
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Bizarro Earth

Pathocrats Turning on Each Other: Partner in Damaged Oil Well Slams BP for "Reckless" Actions -- And Inaction

Joel Achenbach and Steven Mufson
The Washington Post
Sat, 19 Jun 2010 12:27 UTC
Oil covered crabs
© Charlie Riedel/AP Photo
Hermit crabs struggle through patches of oil from the Gulf of Mexico spill on a barrier island off East Grand Terre Island, Louisiana, Sunday. The thickness of the crude oil afflicting some Louisiana beaches is apparently sufficient to stymie even much larger life-forms.
BP's three-front oil spill war -- on the seafloor, on the Gulf Coast and in Congress -- turned into a four-front battle Friday when its main partner in the damaged exploration well blamed the oil giant's "reckless decisions and actions" for causing a disaster that was "preventable."

It was the first time since the blowout in the Gulf of Mexico that Anadarko Petroleum had given its view of the accident, and its chief executive, Jim Hackett, did not mince words. In a statement, Hackett said he was "shocked" by information that has emerged from investigations of the accident. He said it "indicates BP operated unsafely and failed to monitor and react to several critical warning signs during the drilling of the Macondo well."

Anadarko's statement contrasted with the testimony of BP's chief executive, Tony Hayward, who told a congressional committee Thursday that it was too soon to reach conclusions about the disaster's causes.

Comment: It's all a game, folks, a farce, a distraction. They'll all dump on each other the way Scooter Libby took the rap to take the heat off Cheney in the Wilson Spy Case. Then, he got pardoned and is happily raking in dough.

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Bizarro Earth

South Korea: Scientists Warn of Volcanic Activity


Joong Ang Daily
Sat, 19 Jun 2010 00:21 UTC
South Korea is bracing for possible volcanic activity at Mount Paektu on the North Korean-Chinese border, after detecting topographical signs that indicate the dormant mountain may awaken within years, the weather agency said yesterday.

The last volcanic eruption at the 2,744-meter Mount Paektu was in 1903. It has since been considered inactive, but experts became concerned about a possible eruption after a magnitude-7.3 quake hit China's northeastern Jilin Province in 2002.

Since then, minor tremors close to the peak have become 10 times more frequent, experts say. Historic records indicate volcanic activity has previously occurred on the mountain roughly every 100 years.

"We will come up with comprehensive countermeasures within this year at national levels and try to arrange international cooperation as well," said Jeon Byung-sung, chief of the Korea Meteorological Administration in Seoul.

At a KMA seminar earlier this week, an expert said that Mount Paektu could erupt "within several years," citing topographical signs and international studies. Some Chinese experts even predict that there may be an eruption between 2014 and 2015, said Yun Sung-whyo, a geology professor at Pusan National University.
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