is there updated news on the Miss. oil spill?

CNNs 6 am show said nothing and no threads here that I've seen.

yesterday the spill was a huge mess. today?

We need to start drilling offshore again and more importantly, we need to be able to swallow a load of bullshit about how much more advanced our drilling science is now! How can they shove that down our throats when we are seeing evidence to the contrary with our own lying eyes?

http://www.nola.com/






Pictures
http://www.nola.com/katrinaphotos/tp/gallery.ssf?cgi-bin/view_gallery.cgi/nola/view_gallery.ata?g_id=10438

when barges get stopped money stops flowing

the barges were stopped during the upper midwest floods and now this

More @ each article and some picts @ Reuters & AP
http://marketplace.publicradio.org/display/web/2008/07/24/oil_clean_up

Well, you've got response workers up and down the river using small boats and what they're doing is they're putting out a boom, which is a material that sits on the top of the water and kind of corrals oil in different spots. I arrived in town last night and when I got close to the river in downtown New Orleans, there was a real strong smell of diesel oil, so we're monitoring that, and it's Louisiana in the summertime, so everyone's having to drink a lot of water, there's a lot of sweating going on out there, especially with our folks working directly with the oil because they've got to wear a lot of protective equipment to keep themselves safe, so that's one of our biggest concerns this time of the year....


http://www.reuters.com/article/domesticNews/idUSN2420080725
Spill closes Miss. River, shuts off exports

The largest petroleum spill to hit the Mississippi River since 2005's Hurricane Katrina snarled ship traffic on Thursday from New Orleans to the Gulf of Mexico and brought flows of grain and other key exports to a standstill.

The day after a ship collision shut down a 97 mile stretch of water, the river was a traffic jam of about 100 ships waiting to move along the vital link to Midwest grain elevators, coal terminals and other industrial facilities, Coast Guard officials said.

"Think in terms of days for the opening and think in terms of weeks for the cleanup," said Captain Lincoln Stroh of the U.S. Coast Guard. "Think in terms of weeks for the cleanup."

The river is a vital link carrying grain from production areas in the Midwest to export markets abroad. Between 55 and 65 percent of all U.S. corn, soybean and wheat exports leave from the Gulf of Mexico....

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5jtTIoTTgEgRFnfAYDkbzxAlKEZNwD924UR680
About 200 ships were stacked up Friday and more were expected to join them at a bottleneck along the Mississippi River caused by a massive spill of heavy fuel oil at New Orleans
(clip)
Grain barges heading to the American heartland and a 2,000-passenger cruise ship set to dock in New Orleans Friday night were among the vessels unable to get to the 100 miles of river that has been closed since Wednesday.

It was unclear how the bottleneck would impact the flow of refined products from the 10 petroleum plants that line the river between New Orleans and Baton Rouge, La....

thanks for the links

Oiled birds, bah.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/07/25/politics/main4292630.shtml
Nonetheless, even the most optimistic members of the (?) camp would have to concede that this week has not exactly gone smoothly. (?) had to play defense on national security when critics accused him of misstating the Iraq War timeline in an interview with CBS News. His planned trip to an oil rig to advocate for offshore drilling to lower gas prices was canceled thanks to hurricane Dolly. An oil spill on the Mississippi River made for a powerful talking point for opponents of his drilling plan. And he (once again) made reference to Czechoslovakia, despite the fact that that country has not existed for 15 years.

http://blog.nola.com/updates/2008/07/oil_spill_multimedia.html

It looks like the wildlife refuges downriver are getting ready for the spill to make its way there.