You are in the current BP Catastrophe Morning Edition - AUV #406. AUV #405 is here.
The digest of diaries is here.
Please RECOMMEND THIS DIARY, the motherships have been discontinued.
Bookmark this link to find the latest Gulf Watchers diaries.
Please be kind to kossacks with bandwidth issues. Please do not post images or videos. Again, many thanks for this.
PLEASE visit Pam LaPier's diary to find out how you can help the Gulf now and in the future. We don't have to be idle! And thanks to Crashing Vor and Pam LaPier for working on this!
The Wall Street Journalreports that the Gulf was to be offered up to the gods of greed... On Dec. 6, 1989, Shell Oil flashed an announcement that the Anglo-Dutch giant had hit oil—a lot of oil—nearly 3,000 feet below the surface of the Gulf of Mexico.
It made nearly everyone giddy. Politicians in both parties offered incentives to boost offshore production. Regulators—especially under President Bill Clinton—eased rules to support the boom. And oil companies, deploying ever more complex drilling technology, barreled ahead, leaving four administrations scrambling to keep pace.
While environmentalists fought fiercely to prevent offshore oil drilling in places like California—where crude was still being found in shallow waters—they decided to tolerate drilling in the Gulf. One environmentalist dubbed the region a "national sacrifice area."
From the Guardian UK, pictures that will probably make you angry. Not probably - they will make you angry, although the photographs are stunning. Photographer Ed Burtynsky documents the results of the estimated five million barrels of oil that flowed into the Gulf of Mexico.
Drilling Deep, Drilling Dumb
No one can agree on just how much oil gushed into the waters of the Gulf. From Mother Jones a graph that puts the discrepancies into perspective.
The use of dispersantswas then, and remains, controversial. In another piece from Mother Jones...
The Environmental Protection Agency and other federal agencies didn't do their homework on dispersants before the Gulf spill began on April 20. That's the conclusion of a second staff report released Wednesday by the National Oil Spill Commission.
And you'd probably be surprised at just how many rigs there actually are in the Gulf of Mexico. Greenpeace photographer Robert Myers aboard the Arctic Sunrisein the Gulf...
I came to Gulf of Mexico hoping to see a whale, but instead I saw a lot of oil rigs. At no time during our 513 nautical mile (950 km) voyage from Galveston, Texas, out around the Deepwater Horizon oil spill site into Gulfport, Mississippi, were there not oil rigs - giant cranes on ships building new ones, supply vessels in transit, giant oil tankers lined up outside the approaches to Houston - and rigs: big, small, thin and wide. Rigs flaring gas, rigs lit at night like prairie towns from the air - individual clusters of brightness on a dark plain. The ship felt like the center of a watch and all around like hour marks were a circle of lights from the oil rigs.
And from The Independent UK, oil companies could solve the climate crisis - according to Dr. Myles Allen, head of the Climate Dynamics Group at Oxford University...
It would be much more efficient, he said, simply to make all producers of carbon-based fuels accountable for the disposal of the carbon dioxide their fuels ultimately give off, as a condition of remaining in business. Successful climate change policy would involve less government, not more.
From the Associated Press, a cyclist raising money to help those affected by the Gulf spill was killed before finishing his journey...
A Florida man on a cross-country bicycle ride to raise awareness and money for victims of this year's massive Gulf oil spill was struck and killed by a passing vehicle just days before finishing the journey.
Roger Grooters began his ride across America Sept. 10 in Oceanside, Calif. The 66-year-old man's family tells the Pensacola News Journal that he was just days from finishing his 3,200-mile ride when he was hit by a truck outside Panama City, Fla., Wednesday morning.
Funeral services are planned for Monday in Gulf Breeze near Pensacola Beach.
Frontline and ProPublica take on the corporate culture of BP on "The Spill" airing on October 26th at 9PM Eastern. And, as always, check your local listings...
==== ROV Feeds =====
20876/21507 - Development Driller II's ROV 1
32900/49178 - Development Driller II's ROV 2
41434/41436 - Olympic Challenger's ROV 1
40788/40789 - Olympic Challenger's ROV 2
39168/39169 - Chouest Holiday's ROV 1
40492/40493 - Chouest Holiday's ROV 2
Iron Horse ROV 1
47146/47147 - Development Driller III's ROV 1
43698/43699 - Development Driller III's ROV 2
==Multiple stream feeds (hard on browser/bandwidth)==
BP videos All the available directly feeds from BP.
Bobo's lightweight ROV Multi-feed: is the only additional up to date multiple feed site.
See this thread for more info on using video feeds and on linking to video feeds.
Previous Gulf Watcher diaries:
Gulf Watchers Morning Edition - BP Catastrophe AUV #405 - bleeding heart
Gulf Watchers Morning Edition - BP Catastrophe AUV #404 - peraspera
Gulf Watchers Morning Edition - BP Catastrophe AUV #403 - Darryl House
Gulf Watchers Morning Edition - BP Catastrophe AUV #402 - Yasuragi
Gulf Watchers Morning Edition - BP Catastrophe AUV #401 - Lorinda Pike
Gulf Watchers Morning Edition - BP Catastrophe AUV #400 - Yasuragi
Gulf Watchers Morning Edition - BP Catastrophe AUV #399 - Gulf Watchers/peraspera/story/
Gulf Watchers Morning Edition - BP Catastrophe AUV #398 - Gulf Watchers/peraspera/story/
Gulf Watchers Morning Edition - BP Catastrophe AUV #397 - Gulf Watchers/peraspera
Daily Kos Gulf Watchers Morning Edition - BP Catastrophe AUV #396 - Gulf Watchers/peraspera
Daily Kos Gulf Watchers ROV #395 - Condition: transition - BP's Gulf Castastrophe - David PA
Daily Kos Gulf Watchers ROV #394 - Transitions - BP's Gulf Castastrophe - Lorinda Pike
Daily Kos Gulf Watchers ROV #393 - BP's Gulf Catastrophe - Lorinda Pike
Daily Kos Gulf Watchers ROV #392 - BP's Gulf Catastrophe - When Can we Share a Soda? - khowell
Daily Kos Gulf Watchers ROV #391 - BP's Gulf Catastrophe - Talking about Change - khowell
Daily Kos Gulf Watchers ROV #390 - Drips Redux - Lorinda Pike
Daily Kos Gulf Watchers ROV #389 - Night of the Living Drips - Lorinda Pike
Daily Kos Gulf Watchers ROV #388 - Sittin' Up With the Dead - khowell
Daily Kos Gulf Watchers ROV #387 - Time for a Wake? - khowell
Daily Kos Gulf Watchers ROV #386 - The Coroner Won't Pronounce - BP's Gulf Catastrophe - Yasuragi
Daily Kos Gulf Watchers ROV #385 - Is it Dead? - BP's Gulf Catastrophe - Lorinda Pike
The last Mothership has links to reference material.
Previous motherships and ROV's from this extensive live blog effort may be found here.
Again, to keep bandwidth down, please do not post images or videos.