80beats: News Aggregates of the Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill

[bystander]

Discover Blogs / 80beats

• 23 April 2010: Ships Race to Contain the Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill
  26 April 2010: Sunken Oil Rig Now Leaking Crude; Robots Head to the Rescue
  28 April 2010: Coast Guard’s New Plan to Contain the Gulf Oil Spill: Light It on Fire
  29 April 2010: Uh-Oh: Gulf Oil Spill May Be 5 Times Worse Than Previously Thought
  30 April 2010: Gulf Oil Spill Reaches U.S. Coast; New Orleans Reeks of “Pungent Fuel Smell”

BP Oil Spill Incident Response - Gulf of Mexico - Transocean Drilling Incident (Deepwater Horizon)
NOAA's up-to-date assessment of the Deepwater Horizon Incident, Gulf of Mexico

[bystander]

The worst environmental disaster in American history?
New Scientist - 30 April 2010

Scanning the emerging news coverage is a little like watching a train wreck in slow motion.

[owlice]

An old (as in long-time, not age!) friend of mine from Slidell, LA was visiting this weekend. She and her husband were working on their sailboat on Thursday -- docked in the canal behind their house -- and could smell the oil 65 miles away as the crow flies. Sixty-five miles! Imagine what it must be like for those so much closer!

[bystander]

03 May 2010: Gulf Oil Spill: Fisheries Closed, Louisiana Wetlands Now in Jeopardy

Joint Information Centre Website

[bystander]

04 May 2010: Is the Gulf Oil Spill Headed for Florida & North Carolina?

Failure is common on offshore rigs' blowout preventers

[bystander]

05 May 2010: BP Will Tow a “Containment Dome” to the Oil Leak Site Today

ESA: Envisat monitors oil spill proximity to Loop Current

[bystander]

06 May 2010: Gulf Oil Spill: Do Chemical Dispersants Pose Their Own Environmental Risk?

[wonderboy]

An old (as in long-time, not age!) friend of mine from Slidell, LA was visiting this weekend. She and her husband were working on their sailboat on Thursday -- docked in the canal behind their house -- and could smell the oil 65 miles away as the crow flies. Sixty-five miles! Imagine what it must be like for those so much closer!

Must smell as if ur much closer to it just joking owlice, todays Apod was for u eh? new screensaver?


Paul

[owlice]

I'm sure today's APOD was not for me, but I appreciate it all the same! And what a good idea, to use it as a screensaver! I use my avatar as my desktop image (it's downright frightening at fullscreen size!), and it is fitting that a pair of universal owls should join him!

[wonderboy]

On a serious note? how are they gonna fix this? Its a major disaster that needs sorting. Will they just burn it? if so that'll clearly cause some environmental damage of its own.

Paul.

[neufer]

Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill Observed From the International Space Station

<<The Chandeleur Islands (French: Les Îles de Chandeleur [Candlemas/Groundhog's Day]) are a chain of uninhabited barrier islands approximately 50 miles (80 km) long, located in the Gulf of Mexico. They form the easternmost point of the state of Louisiana, USA and are a part of the Breton National Wildlife Refuge. They are an important migrating point for many birds on their way south, and are a prime marsh and forest wildlife area.

The islands were formed over two thousand years ago as the rim of the St. Bernard Lobe of the Mississippi River delta.

Prior to destruction by a hurricane in 1915 there was a fishing settlement on the islands, and even earlier there had been farming on the islands. An old lighthouse built in the 1960s stood as a landmark and recognizable location for pilots flying over the Gulf of Mexico. This lighthouse, and the islands, were constantly eroded and changed by wave action, and most dramatically after the storm surges following hurricanes.

The islands have been generally shrinking and migrating landward since the late 1800s. A survey in the 1980s estimated that they would be in existence for about three more centuries. Before 1996, the seaward front of the islands lost about 20-30 feet of land each year, mostly replaced at the rear. From 1996 to 2004, the loss rate grew to about 300 feet per year. In 1998, Hurricane Georges destroyed the islands and left the lighthouse in the middle of the ocean, and the barrier islands only just recovered when Hurricane Katrina struck in 2005. However, the combined effect of Hurricane Dennis and Hurricane Katrina in 2005 reduced the island to shoals or sub-surface formations, and toppled the Chandeleur Island Lighthouse.

The left image is from 2004 and the right is after Hurricane Katrina, showing the reduction of the islands.

[neufer]

http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colber ... -oil-spill

[bystander]

10 May 2010: BP’s Containment Dome Failed. Can Garbage Injections Stop up the Leaks?
07 May 2010: 5 Offshore Oil Hotspots Beyond the Gulf That Could Boom–or Go Boom


Oil Spill Continues in Gulf of Mexico (NASA/MODIS Rapid Response Team)

[bystander]

Latest Images from NASA
Images from NASA's Earth Observatory
Images from the MODIS Rapid Response Team

[bystander]

12 May 2010: Testimony Highlights 3 Major Failures That Caused Gulf Spill

Index: 80beats: Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill

[The Code]

I am going to fill up, somewhere else from now on. This is disgraceful.

Not long ago they where boasting of there huge, Profits. Pretty soon they will boasting of there huge losses.

Mark

[bystander]

14 May 2010: Scientists Say Gulf Spill Is Way Worse Than Estimated. How’d We Get It So Wrong?

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WYFYVNvg ... r_embedded[/youtube]

[bystander]

17 May 2010: Good News: BP’s Oil Siphon Is Working. Bad News: Florida Keys Are in Danger

[bystander]

Gulf of Mexico oil spill in the Loop Current
ESA Portal - 19 May 2010

Scientists monitoring the US oil spill with ESA’s Envisat radar satellite say that it has entered the Loop Current, a powerful conveyor belt that flows clockwise around the Gulf of Mexico towards Florida.

In this Envisat Advanced Synthetic Aperture Radar (ASAR) image, acquired on 18 May 2010, advanced processing methods have been performed to display ocean surface roughness variations and Doppler-derived ocean surface radial velocities around the oil spill area in the Gulf of Mexico. A long tendril of the oil spill (outlined in white) is visible extending down into the Loop Current (red arrow).

Credits: CLS

[bystander]

19 May 2010: Gulf Oil Spill: Fishing Ban Expanded; Endangered Turtles Threatened

[bystander]

20 May 2010: Good News for Florida, Bad News for Louisiana’s Wetlands

[neufer]

20 May 2010: Good News for Florida, Bad News for Louisiana’s Wetlands

<<Will the Florida Keys catch a break with the loop current? Most observers are now in agreement that one of the biggest ecological worries about the BP oil spill—that it could reach the Gulf of Mexico’s loop current that flows to the Keys—has begun to occur.

However, The New York Times reports today via Greenwire that eddies around the edge of the current are keeping much of the oil out of it.>>

[bystander]

Five Questions on the Oil Spill
Science Insider - 20 May 2010

Sizing up the weeks-long spill in the Gulf of Mexico and its impacts is proving a challenge for marine and coastal scientists. The source is beneath 1600 meters of seawater, the winds and currents spreading the oil can be capricious, and the marine life in the oil's path is spread over hundreds of square kilometers, from the sea floor to the surface. Commercial fisheries have already been affected, and fragile coastal marshlands are at risk. Just monitoring all these ecosystems is the first challenge; gauging the toll taken and sounding the all clear will come later. Here are five of the key questions that scientists will be trying to answer over the coming months and years.

1. What's happening with the oil?
2. What's happening to life on the sea floor?
3. What's happening to marine life?
4. What's happening to coastal ecosystems?
5. What's happening to fisheries?

The question pages will be update regularly, so check them frequently.

[AlanMor]

bystander thanks for putting the news and making everyone aware of what is going on with this terrible disaster. I just pray to God this will end soon and that hopefully the majority of marine life will survive.

[bystander]

21 May 2010: BP to Switch Disperants; Will Kevin Costner Save Us All?