The Exxon Valdez is going to pale in comparison

Seth wrote:
Pawz wrote:

More seriously though, past events seem to indicate that a large oil spill does *not* mean the killing off of the entire ecosystem forever, and that with the last one it DID return to 100% a lot quicker than expected. At this point we're not really concerned about whether or not turtle Bill is dead, we're concerned that turtle species A is going to die off entirely.

Are you referring to Prince William Sound? I'd read recently that, 20 years after Exxon Valdez, the salmon in that region were still inedible and oil persists there that was nearly as toxic as it was in 1989. I don't have any solid sources, though.

btw -- BP stock is now at 37.24. That's up 11 dollars from a couple weeks ago.

I'd need to see your source. But anecdotally I can say it's total crap.

Salmon don't live in one place. They go out into the ocean to live and only show up near land when they're going to spawn. They had a successful run of salmon big enough for both commercial and sport fishing the year following the spill, and every year since. There were adjustments that had to be made for the fourth year afterward, because that was the generation that was actually somewhat impacted, and all they did was limit fishing days for both sport and commercial until they had counted enough for proper escapement. They do that every year anyways.

Ongoing, interception and overfishing are the biggest problem they have. Technology has made it possible for international fishing fleets from Asia and Russia to find the fish in the deep ocean and catch them before they get back to their spawning grounds and more importantly, the catch limits and other regulations of local waters. That's caused a much bigger headache for the fishermen in Prince William Sound than the oil.

Crab and bottom fish are what got hit by the oil, but in the intervening years they also recovered nicely.

Apparently I completely made up the salmon thing. here's what I found, given 33 seconds of google fu:

Wild pink salmon, for example, are listed as a “recovered” species, evidenced by a 2007 run estimated at 11.6 million fish. Their numbers, aided by a large hatchery operation, have rebounded from a low of 1.3 million three years after the spill. But it is hard to determine what is normal: pink salmon in the Sound before the spill varied from a high of 23.5 million fish in 1984 to a low of 2.1 million in 1988.

And while salmon are seen as a success story, the ecosystem in the sound is crippled by the failure to see a return of the huge schools of Pacific herring, which were hit by the spill just as they were spawning. The herring fishery, which provided up to half of the income of Cordova fishermen, has been closed to commercial fishing except for a few brief periods since the spill.

Scientists say they do not really understand why the herring stock has not rebounded. But they do believe that failure has reduced populations of seabirds that feed on the small fish. Investigators believe that 100,000 to 300,000 of the estimated 1 million seabirds in Prince William Sound died initially. Different species have recovered at different rates — murres have gradually returned in large numbers but other species like Harlequin Ducks and Black Oystercatchers have not — and the waterfowl may not fully recover until the herring are again healthy.

The food chain has magnified the effect of the spill in other insidious ways. Orcas, or killer whales, in the sound are afflicted by bio-accumulation of toxins. Fourteen out of the 36 killer whales in the resident Prince William Sound pod disappeared shortly after the spill. Researchers believe their lungs were seared by the toxic fumes, though orca carcasses usually sink, so no autopsy was possible.

it goes on for quite a bit after that.

Robear wrote:

Hmm, I don't think people would be fishing there if the salmon were contaminated...

I don't think it's safe to assume that something is smart just because people are doing it.

LobsterMobster wrote:
Robear wrote:

Hmm, I don't think people would be fishing there if the salmon were contaminated...

I don't think it's safe to assume that something is smart just because people are doing it.

As shown by all the people fishing the East and Hudson rivers...

I'm by no means an expert in the oil business or economics, and certainly the moratorium on drilling will hurt the gulf economy, but I can't help but think the recent implied threats that it will cause companies to pack up their toys and move entirely overseas and we'll never, ever, ever see them again is as ludicrous as junkies threatening en mass declaring they're going to get up off the crack. It's not like they can take reserves with them, and once the moratorium is lifted, someone will fill that void. Granted, this is a free market concept I don't expect Congress' free marketeers to grasp.

SpacePPoliceman wrote:

I'm by no means an expert in the oil business or economics, and certainly the moratorium on drilling will hurt the gulf economy, but I can't help but think the recent implied threats that it will cause companies to pack up their toys and move entirely overseas and we'll never, ever, ever see them again is as ludicrous as junkies threatening en mass declaring they're going to get up off the crack. It's not like they can take reserves with them, and once the moratorium is lifted, someone will fill that void. Granted, this is a free market concept I don't expect Congress' free marketeers to grasp.

Not to mention it's not the fault of "drilling." Most wells don't do this and there has been some suggestion that BP was cutting corners. It's obvious that we aren't going to leave the oil there just because it devastated an economy, drove a few species extinct and made us very sad that one time. The moratorium is just a political maneuver to show that "something is being done."

At the very most it will give us time to look at precisely what went down before the explosion and make sure future wells have better safeguards.

Safeguard 1: if you see giant chunks of rubber coming out of the well, something important is broken.

LobsterMobster wrote:
SpacePPoliceman wrote:

I'm by no means an expert in the oil business or economics, and certainly the moratorium on drilling will hurt the gulf economy, but I can't help but think the recent implied threats that it will cause companies to pack up their toys and move entirely overseas and we'll never, ever, ever see them again is as ludicrous as junkies threatening en mass declaring they're going to get up off the crack. It's not like they can take reserves with them, and once the moratorium is lifted, someone will fill that void. Granted, this is a free market concept I don't expect Congress' free marketeers to grasp.

Not to mention it's not the fault of "drilling." Most wells don't do this and there has been some suggestion that BP was cutting corners. It's obvious that we aren't going to leave the oil there just because it devastated an economy, drove a few species extinct and made us very sad that one time. The moratorium is just a political maneuver to show that "something is being done."

At the very most it will give us time to look at precisely what went down before the explosion and make sure future wells have better safeguards.

Safeguard 1: if you see giant chunks of rubber coming out of the well, something important is broken.

I have no reason to doubt the stated intention that the moratorium is to give regulatory and enforcement agencies the needed time to inspect current and ongoing drilling projects to see if they are safe and in compliance. There is ample reason to believe that enforcement in the past was nearly non-existent. Under the circumstances, I don't think a pause to allow inspectors to figure things out is unreasonable.

If the rigs are leaving the Gulf, just as likely an explanation is that they don't want to be caught doing exactly the kind of crap that led to this latest disaster. And their leaving is not altogether a bad thing.

Paleocon wrote:

And their leaving is not altogether a bad thing.

Nor is it permanent.

LobsterMobster wrote:
Paleocon wrote:

And their leaving is not altogether a bad thing.

Nor is it permanent.

Yup. It's interesting that the same folks that insist that the rigs will be gone for good are the ones who insist that the fish will be right back. It seems to me that there is a very similar mechanism at work in both. Both caused by the spill.

Cap in place and leaking stopped, according to the news. Yay!

Cap in place and leaking stopped, according to the news. Yay!

Its not over yet.

But please, please, please let it hold together until the relief wells are complete. And further please, please, please let them not f*ck up the relief well after we finally stopped the gushing!

Yep, this isn't the end of it, but man is it ever good news.

Oddly (or maybe not) my first reaction was not believing them.

All they did was cap the riser head, something they could have done awhile ago. If the casing isnt intact and the pressure caused other fissures then this is nothing more than a smoke and mirror show. Really stop and think a minute about the fact that the reason they have had everyone transfixed on the riser is that they don't want people looking at whats going on at the seafloor within a 10 mile radius or so from the well head. The audacity of their PR to state that "there is no more oil leaking into the gulf" says alot about whats going on cause there is absolutly no way for them to know that until they can extensively survey the ocean floor.

Everyone is going to buy into this and the media coverage will dwindle and BP will win yet another PR victory.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cAhZ9...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Txb5u...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VYusk...

I truly hope Simmons is wrong.

Hmm. I read that the pressure in the bore is close to what they'd expect if the casing was intact. I'm really hoping it is - the gulf could do without another 3 months of this.

jam3 wrote:

The audacity of their PR to state that "there is no more oil leaking into the gulf" says alot about whats going on cause there is absolutly no way for them to know that until they can extensively survey the ocean floor.

They never said there is no more oil leaking into the gulf. They said there is no more oil in the gulf. Which I really hope is not what he meant to say, because that is offensively ridiculous.

The reason they took so long to do this was that the government was concerned the remaining casing couldn't handle the pressure. They didn't want it to burst under the sea bed, which I'm assuming is like the difference between massive external bleeding and massive internal bleeding: the internal stuff isn't as scary looking but is much more dangerous and harder to stop.

Update: Pressure readings say there's still a leak somewhere. Link

Scientists (presumably with real lab coats) have concluded that the seepage near the blown-out well is unrelated. It's just naturally occurring leakage.

Where was that picture we saw from a while back that showed they had to drill down the depth of a skyscraper to reach the oil? They totally should have just moved two miles to the left. Stuff was apparently dripping out there on its own.

LobsterMobster wrote:

Scientists (presumably with real lab coats) have concluded that the seepage near the blown-out well is unrelated. It's just naturally occurring leakage.

Where was that picture we saw from a while back that showed they had to drill down the depth of a skyscraper to reach the oil? They totally should have just moved two miles to the left. Stuff was apparently dripping out there on its own.

That sounds like a fantastic story, just not one I particularly believe. Was this stuff there before the drilling?

Seepage does occur naturally. However, this particular selection of it seems awfully coincidental.

So the pressures are lower than they expect, and there's a lot of seepage near the well, and somehow that's natural?

Bullsh*t.

IMAGE(http://img62.imageshack.us/img62/6439/remaincalmmedium.jpg)

Malor wrote:

So the pressures are lower than they expect, and there's a lot of seepage near the well, and somehow that's natural?

Bullsh*t.

OK, let me say that I don't buy it either but if it's seeping from the same source then it would lower the pressure in all other wells.

LobsterMobster wrote:
Malor wrote:

So the pressures are lower than they expect, and there's a lot of seepage near the well, and somehow that's natural?

Bullsh*t.

OK, let me say that I don't buy it either but if it's seeping from the same source then it would lower the pressure in all other wells.

Unless it's seepage from further damage to this specific pipeline under the surface, in which case it could be indicative of a larger problem here.

Farscry wrote:
LobsterMobster wrote:
Malor wrote:

So the pressures are lower than they expect, and there's a lot of seepage near the well, and somehow that's natural?

Bullsh*t.

OK, let me say that I don't buy it either but if it's seeping from the same source then it would lower the pressure in all other wells.

Unless it's seepage from further damage to this specific pipeline under the surface, in which case it could be indicative of a larger problem here.

I'm not saying it's the ONLY reason there could be lower pressure.. which would be why I said, "I don't buy it either." All I'm saying is that that part is at least physically possible.

Ah, ok, I misunderstood you there Lobster.

BP Employee 1: "Gee that buzzing sound is really annoying, what's it from?"
BP Employee 2: "Oh that's the alarm to tell us if something is wrong with the well that could potentially destroy the entire rig and us with it."
BP Employee 1: "Ugh it's really loud. Can we shut it off?"
BP Employee 2: "Sure. I don't see why not!"

http://www.cnn.com/2010/US/07/23/gulf.platform.alert/index.html?hpt=T1

While that's moronic and terrible, do we know that any alarms would have gone off in time for them to avert the disaster?

EDIT: Now BP is stalling payments for oil spill victims: Link

Not for the money, you understand. They just don't have the answers to their questions yet.

Questions like: where the f*** is my money, BP?

I don't think the alarm would have made any difference in averting the disaster. The BoP was broken, knowing there's gas surging out on deck wouldn't change the fact that the crew had no way to shut off the well.

I'm not even sure you can convincingly argue that the alarm would have saved lives. In an optimal situation, maybe they would have had time to perform an emergency disconnect and everyone would have survived. Instead, I'd bet that the alarm would have brought more people up on deck to deal with the emergency and even more people would have died in the initial gas explosion.

For me, this is yet another interesting tidbit of information that makes you wonder about all the other rigs out there. How many others either have hyperactive alarms that have conditioned the crews to basically ignore them, or have led the crew to flat out disable them?

I think the focus should be on pushing the oil industry to design better, more accurate monitoring systems that the crew can rely on, however I'm sure the blamestorming will continue instead.

MikeMac wrote:

For me, this is yet another interesting tidbit of information that makes you wonder about all the other rigs out there. How many others either have hyperactive alarms that have conditioned the crews to basically ignore them, or have led the crew to flat out disable them?

Yeah, I work for a company which makes network management software (tells you when your server is down, etc.)

We've had repeated requests for adding support for "nagging notices" where if someone doesn't acknowledge a notification about a service going down in a certain amount of time, it sends another.

The feature request for this in our bug tracker was until recently called "Ability to set a notification as nagging," I renamed it to "Ability to set a notification as nagging (train admins to ignore notifications)" a few days ago. As a coworker joked, someone requesting nagging notifications doesn't have a technical problem, they have an HR problem.