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Better weather spurs hope over US oil spill



By Mira Oberman
Mon May 3, 7:13 pm ET

VENICE, Louisiana (AFP) – Kinder weather aided efforts Monday to counter a giant oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, as BP prepared to launch an unprecedented operation to try to contain the main leak with a giant dome.

"We expect to load out the fabricated containment chamber tomorrow and we hope to have the system up and operating within a week," BP Chief Operating Officer Doug Suttles told reporters.

The dome is the first of three designed to be placed "over the leak sources and allow us to collect the oil, funnel it up through pipework to a drill ship called Enterprise on the surface."

Weekend storms grounded aerial sorties of dispersants and prevented skimming vessels from mopping up the growing 130-mile (200 kilometer) by 70-mile (110 kilometer) slick, which could wreak huge economic and environmental damage on the fragile region.

But an army of more than 2,500 responders and some 200 boats took advantage of better forecasts Monday to lay out miles of protective booms, relaunch skimming vessels and train local fishermen for the cleanup effort.

"It's looking better," said Petty Officer Curtis Ainsley, the leader of a coast guard team surveying the widening slick and installing mobile protective boom stations on boats.

"If we can get the seas to lay down for us we can make a dent," Ainsley said. "As soon as we can get the vessels here and the booms laid down we can get started skimming."

An indeterminate amount of crude, estimated to be at least 210,000 gallons a day, has been streaming from the wellhead below the Deepwater Horizon rig that sank on April 22, two days after a massive explosion that killed 11 workers.

The spill, now thought to be running into the millions of gallons overall and covering an area the size of a small country, has sparked fears of an environmental catastrophe.

Louisiana boasts some 40 percent of US wetlands -- prime spawning waters for fish, shrimp and crabs and a major stop for migratory birds -- and cleaning up a maze of channels accessible only by boat would be all but impossible.

BP has been operating a fleet of robotic submarines in the murky depths for more than a week to try to activate the blowout preventer, a giant 450-tonne valve system that should have shut off the oil after the initial accident.

One has also been pumping dispersant directly into three leaks, but overflight data is needed before it is known if this is having a significant impact on the amount of oil reaching the surface.

On Sunday afternoon BP started operations on a relief well, penetrating the sea floor as it began drilling down to approximately 18,000 feet so that special fluids and then cement ultimately can be injected in to cap the oil.

With this process expected to take up to three months, immediate attention is focusing on giant containment structures that could be deployed as early as this weekend to cover the leaking pipe a mile down on the seabed.

Suttles admitted there would be "technical challenges" in trying to sink a 65-tonne structure down so deep, but said that despite the extreme pressure physics was to some extent in their favor.

"What allows this to work is the fact that oil is less dense than water and wants to float.

"Essentially an oil column exerts less pressure than a water column so that helps push the oil to the surface and we can assist that with other means."

Although President Barack Obama spoke Sunday during a visit to the region of a "potentially unprecedented environmental disaster," no impacts of oil on US shores have yet been confirmed.

self. There was no sign of oil Monday morning at the pilot station about two miles north of the Gulf of Mexico at the Southwest Pass, the main entrance to the Mississippi River for cargo ships and deep water vessels.

But two of the pilots who shepherd the ships up the river spotted what looked like an oiled gull. "This one looked dirty," Captain Michael Fitzpatrick told AFP.

The bird was fluttering its wings in the water beneath the station and then flew and landed about 30 yards on a rocky breakwater, where it anxiously preened it "We keep holding our fingers, hoping we'll dodge the bullet," said Fitzpatrick. Seeing the bird puts "a sick feeling in your stomach. A real sick feeling.

"People like us who work around here, we respect the nature. We enjoy it. We love it. You never think it can all be taken away."



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Better weather aids fight on oil slick



By Matthew Bigg
Tuesday, May 4, 2010

VENICE, Louisiana (Reuters) – A flotilla of nearly 200 boats tackled a massive oil slick in the Gulf of Mexico on Tuesday, taking advantage of calmer weather to intensify the fight to reduce the spill and limit its impact on the U.S. shoreline.

Energy giant BP Plc, under heavy pressure in Washington, struggled to plug a gushing undersea leak that threatened to wreak havoc on Gulf Coast fishing and tourism and reshape the U.S. political debate on offshore drilling.

Calmer seas after days of high winds aided one of the biggest oil containment operations ever attempted.

Boats were laying down and repairing miles of boom lines strung along Gulf shores to try to fend off and contain a drifting slick estimated to be at least 130 miles by 70 miles in size.

Weather forecaster Accuweather.com said favorable winds and waves could keep the slick from reaching the Gulf coastline for a few more days or longer.

"With the conditions turning better and better, it's encouraging," Coast Guard Petty Officer Matthew Schofield said from the Joint Information Center in Roberts, Louisiana.

"It's a moving target ... There are a lot of factors in how it moves and disperses," he said of the slick. "There have been no reports of thick oil on shore."

BP shares showed signs of bottoming out on Tuesday after an almost two-week slide. BP's London-listed shares, which did not trade on Monday due to a public holiday, were down 3 percent at 555 pence, in line with a 3.2 percent fall in the STOXX Europe 600 Oil and Gas index. In New York, BP American Deposit Receipts traded up 1.2 percent after falling on Monday.

The stock has fallen about 17 percent in the two weeks since the company announced an explosion and fire on the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig, which subsequently sank, unleashing a massive oil flow into the sea.

Oil prices briefly rallied on Monday on concerns the spill could disrupt U.S. imports or Gulf Coast refineries, although major facilities reported no impact on operations. On Tuesday prices dived more than 3 percent as traders refocused on a rallying dollar and growing euro sovereign risk concerns.

The looming disaster threatens to eclipse the 1989 Exxon Valdez catastrophe in Alaska, the worst previous U.S. oil spill to date.

'DISASTER FOR YEARS AND YEARS'

"Our biggest concern is that the oil comes in any kind of volume and settles in the cane. Once it settles it destroys the cane and kills the shrimp," charter boat captain Dan Dix said in Venice, Louisiana.

"If you kill the shrimp, you kill the fish that feed off the shrimp, and if you kill the fish then there is nothing left in the Gulf of Mexico. That would absolutely be a disaster for years and years," he said.

U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates approved requests from three more governors of Gulf Coast states to fund the deployment of thousands of National Guard troops to respond to the oil slick, the Pentagon said.

In addition to backing Louisiana's request for up to 6,000 Guard members, Gates also approved requests from Mississippi for 6,000 Guard members, Alabama for 3,000 and Florida for 2,500.

"We are committed to preventing as much of the economic damage as possible by working to contain the impact of this potentially devastating spill," President Barack Obama said.

BP, a London-based energy giant, said it was rushing efforts to plug the leak but could not offer concrete assurance of immediate results.

It has completed the first of three massive steel and concrete domes it will try to place this week over one of three leaks nearly a mile under the water's surface. The 98-tonne, 40-foot iron box is designed to channel oil through a pipe to the surface where it can be collected on a barge.

But BP has never deployed the structure at a depth of 5,000 feet and cannot guarantee the effort will pay off.

The accident highlighted the difficult politics of balancing U.S. energy security and worries about protecting the environment and industries that depend on it, like fishing.

It forced Obama to suspend plans to expand offshore oil drilling, unveiled last month partly to woo Republican support for climate legislation.

Florida Democratic Senator Bill Nelson, a fierce opponent of offshore drilling because of the environmental risks it entails, said the expanded drilling proposals were "dead on arrival" in Congress.

California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger pulled his support for expanded drilling off his state's coast, citing the Gulf spill. His reversal came after he had called for more oil drilling off California to raise money to help cover a $20 billion state budget shortfall.

GRANTS FOR THREATENED STATES

The Mississippi River delta and other areas of the U.S. Gulf Coast are threatened by contact from the leak, spewing from the ocean floor at a rate estimated at more than 5,000 barrels (210,000 gallons/795,000 liters) a day.

BP said it is releasing $25 million each in block grants to Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida to jump-start clean-up projects. The funding can be used for numerous expenses such as vessels for hire.

BP has spent several years working to burnish its environmental image. It now faces a public relations nightmare as well as intense pressure from the Obama administration to get the situation under control.

Over the weekend it started a relief well that could stop the leak, the company said. Still, this operation is expected to take two to three months to complete.


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Weather aids oil slick fight; current feared



By Matthew Bigg
May 5, 2010

VENICE, Louisiana (Reuters) – Workers toiled above and below the surface of the Gulf of Mexico on Wednesday to plug a gushing oil leak and protect the U.S. shoreline in one of the biggest spill containment efforts ever mounted.

Mother Nature continued to play a favorable hand. Prevailing winds were expected to hold the giant oil slick offshore for several more days.

Conditions will also allow for the first "controlled burn" of the massive oil slick since a 28-minute blaze on April 28 that removed thousands of gallons of fuel, officials said.

Controlled burns remove oil from the open water in an effort to protect shoreline and wildlife.

No populated areas are expected to be affected by Wednesday's burn and officials anticipated no impact on marine mammals and sea turtles. The Environmental Protection Agency will monitor air quality during the burning.

Elsewhere, crews deployed miles of protective booms to block the huge slick and used dispersants to try to break up the thick oil as it slowly drifted near popular tourist beaches and fertile fishing grounds, threatening an environmental catastrophe.

London-based energy giant BP used remote-operated undersea vehicles to cap one of three leaks in the ruptured well but oil still flowed at an unchanged rate of 5,000 barrels (210,000 gallons/795,000 liters) per day.

A giant steel containment device to be placed over the leaking well was on a barge headed to the site on Wednesday and would be operating within six days, although it has never been tested at that depth and there is no guarantee of success.

"This has never been done before in 5,000 feet of water or more. They are going to be considerate and take their time," BP spokesman Mike Abendoff said.

BP has also started drilling a relief well, but that could take two or three months to complete.

MOBILIZED TO FIGHT SPILL

Several hundred boats took advantage of a second consecutive day of calm seas to lay down miles of containment booms and deploy dispersants, and thousands of military and civilian personnel participated in the operations.

In addition, 2,000 volunteers in Gulf coast communities prepared to assist in the cleanup.

Authorities were on alert for the first major landfall of the oil slick, estimated to be at least 130 miles by 70 miles in size, and scientists monitored the impact on marine and coastal wildlife in the region.

"The risks posed by the BP oil spill to the Gulf Coast's environment and economy continue to grow," said National Wildlife Federation President Larry Schweiger.

"The oil we're seeing on the water's surface is only part of the problem. Much of it has been sunk by dispersants and suspended in the water column, posing a grave threat to fish and other marine life," he said.

BP shares hovered flat on Wednesday, rising 0.4 percent, after almost two weeks of declines that wiped more than $32 billion from the company's market value. The STOXX Europe 600 Oil and Gas index stayed steady on Wednesday.

Analysts said the sell-off after the spill was viewed as an overreaction, but Moody's Investors Service cut its outlook on BP debt to negative, citing uncertainty over the costs related to the oil spill. [ID:nLDE644ISZ]

The spill forced President Barack Obama to suspend plans to expand offshore oil drilling, unveiled last month partly to woo Republican support for climate legislation.

The White House and U.S. lawmakers vowed to review a law limiting BP's liability for lost revenues from fishing, tourism and other businesses to $75 million and raise it to $10 billion.

Suttles said BP, which has promised to pay cleanup costs, would pay "legitimate" claims.

"I don't think the $75 million cap is going to be the issue," Suttles told CNN. "Any impacts that are legitimate and created by this, we'll meet those responsibilities."

U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar is scheduled to visit wildlife refuges in Alabama and Louisiana later on Wednesday to keep the pressure on BP after the explosion of the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig, which killed 11 workers and started the flow of oil into the sea.

Other top U.S. officials continue to beat a path to the Gulf Coast to monitor containment and cleanup efforts.

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, Commerce Secretary Gary Locke, NOAA Administrator Jane Lubchenco and EPA Deputy Administrator Bob Perciasepe will travel to the region this week to meet with federal, state and local officials, as well as local business leaders.

KEEPING WATCH

Environmental regulators reported a "first sighting" of a slick near the Chandeleur Islands, three narrow islands off the southeast coast of Louisiana, on Tuesday. Local officials worried another potential swing in wind direction could threaten the Chandeleurs.

"We have not received any confirmed landfall of oil," said Petty Officer David Mosley of the U.S. Coast Guard, who spoke from the Unified Command Center in Roberts, Louisiana.

In Venice, Louisiana, workers loaded lengths of boom onto a barge as part of a plan to protect a vast network of inshore estuaries and canals that form the Mississippi Delta.

"We will monitor the water quality from the barge and at the first sign of oil we will deploy (the boom) immediately," said Kurt Fromherz, spokesman for Plaquemines parish.

The leak, still weeks or months away from being stopped, threatens to eclipse the 1989 Exxon Valdez catastrophe in Alaska, the worst U.S. oil spill. Mississippi, Alabama and Florida are also threatened by the leak.

If the slick contacts the so-called Loop sea current, the oily sheen could eventually be carried to Miami in southern Florida, or as far as North Carolina's barrier islands, warned Robert Weisberg, a physical oceanographer at the University of South Florida.

"Exactly when the oil will enter the Loop Current at the surface is unknown, but it appears to be imminent," Weisberg said, referring to the prevailing current in the Gulf.


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