Apologies for the short nature of this diary, but new reports are that coming out that 9,000,000 gallons may be in the gulf waters - the entire Valdez disaster was around 11,000,000, with much, much more in store as the crisis continues.
First it was 1,000 barrels a day. Then 5,000. Now it could be 25,000/daily. Will it go higher? And it won't stop any time soon...We may be looking at one of the worst environmental disasters ever when it's all said and done.
The WSJ is reporting this new assessment is based on Ian MacDonald with FSU who has been tracking satellite imagery.
I 'm not seeing much more reported on this right now and don't have access to read the full story but suffice to say, things could go downhill much quicker than anticipated now.
(Update) - Thanks to Mogolori for linking some numbers to put the current spill in some context. At the current rate (and that assumes the 25k barrels/day doesn't get even worse), we could be looking at 94.5 million gallons spilled by the time the leak starts, 8 times the Valdez disaster.