Gulf spill provokes worries of 'unbelievable' damage (unprecedented economic+environmental disaster)

Source: McClatchy

Gulf spill provokes worries of 'unbelievable' damage

By Renee Schoof | McClatchy Newspapers

WASHINGTON — With a quick solution ominously uncertain, the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is on track to become an unprecedented economic and environmental disaster with millions of gallons of oil destroying an ecosystem as well as a way of life.

BP America said Monday that it would take another 75 days to finish one of two relief wells it's drilling to shut down the flow. By then, if the spill doesn't worsen and the relief well stops the leak, some 20 million gallons of oil will be swirling in the gulf, nearly double the Exxon Valdez spill in 1989.

Unlike the Alaska spill, which coated a rock-strewn bay, BP's oil will cling to a sponge-like coast, entering the pores of mangrove forests and sea-grass beds and the breeding grounds for crabs, shrimp and oysters.

Already some of the richest fishing grounds of the gulf are off-limits, idling thousands of commercial fishermen. Some restaurants in New Orleans and elsewhere are either out of homegrown oysters or are down to less than a week's supply.



Read more: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2010/05/11/93951/gulf-spill-provokes-worries-of.html

arrogant greedy f***s

Compared to wind or solar? This spill should alter those calculations significantly.

Seems to me we're gonna change our way of life.... whether we like it or not. (reality is like that)

It would have been nice to do it gradually and with a plan, but now it will change FAST.... without any "plan". We coulda been weaning ourselves off oil for the past 30 years, but now we have to deal with crap like this and the dangers of more crap like this and the "change in our way of life" involves not how we get our energy, but how we deal with a ruined Gulf of Mexico.

No one seems to present this disaster as international. It's all about local fishing and the American gulf cost states. What about Mexico (for whom the gulf is named...y'know) and the Islands in the Caribbean? What about international fishing industries? What if the slick creeps into the Atlantic proper?

Especially the point about the impact on Mexico, Carribean, and points beyond.

This spill is coughing us up onto the shores of Nineveh. How many more will it take before Americans realize that we must change our ways and use stop using oil for energy and transportation. We will continue to need oil for some other purposes, but we should not just burn it.

Oil is central to our lives. The supply is limited. We should not just burn it.

the cost of the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and anywhere else you coincidentally find fossil fuels and the U.S. military.

Al Gore on the oil gusher:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x8295573

Will they try to use safe guards that were not used on the first hole. What if it is impossible drill at that depth with today's technology?