 | Bob Gabordi is executive editor of the Tallahassee Democrat and Tallahassee.com. He can be reached through this blog, at bgabordi@tallahassee.com or (850) 599-2177 |
There is good news from the Gulf, although how good the news really is remains to be seen. I’m not really getting too excited yet.
On Sunday, the Unified Area Command – the group charged with coordinating the overall response to the BP oil spill -- said a nearly mile-long tube was inserted into the leak and has begun pumping oil and natural gas onto a surface ship.
This morning, speaking on NBC’s “Today” show, BP Chief Operating Officer Doug Suttles said the tube is collecting about 1,000 barrels per day, or 42,000 gallons, of the oil. That’s about 20 percent of the oil spewing into the Gulf. BP had estimated 210,000 gallons per day were leaking, at least officially.
The pipe is merely 4 inches in diameter, but Suttles told NBC’s Matt Lauer that the pipe might be able to get close to 5,000 gallons per day and that the company was in the process of “ramping up” the use of the pipe as a collection tool.
I listened intently three times to a video of a press conference conducted over the weekend by Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar, Coast Guard Rear Adm. Mary Landry and Suttles. At that point, Suttles was only willing to say the pipe was collecting “some amount” of oil and natural gas. The gas is being burned off on the ship that is collecting the oil. Here is a link to the video of a press conference this weekend.
In the face of tough questioning on a major environmental and economic disaster, Suttles has been the face of calm. He has appeared forthright, but his answers have not provided much information, and certainly very little comfort.
Stopping the incessant flow is one thing; if this works or even slows the flow while a permanent solution is found, thank God for that.
But dealing with the consequences of what is already in the water may be with us for years to come.
A story over the weekend by Tallahassee Democrat and Florida Capital News Bureau Chief Jim Ash compared this spill to one that occurred in 1979 called Ixtoc I. That spill eventually hit across 200 miles of Texas beaches; it continues to result in tar balls turning up along that coast.
Workers have already recovered 6.6 million gallons of oily water and used 580,000 gallons of dispersants to try to break up the oil. Environmentalists and others worry that the fix might have longer lasting detriments than the oil: The impact of the use of the dispersants on the environment is not fully known.
There are some 17,000 workers and some 750 vessels involved in the clean up. Some 1.7 millions of feet of boon have been deployed, with another 1.1 million feet available.
Much of that is dealing with the oil on or near the top of the surface, but the fear right now is a miles-long glob that some are likening to a mushroom cloud. Researchers are worried that it is close to or might have already entered the “loop current.” The Associated Press reported today that “underwater plumes of oil that could poison and suffocate sea life across the food chain, with damage that could endure for a decade or more.”
Some researchers say that the damage could be historically severe if the globs work their way into the Gulf Stream and impact the Florida Keys and the east coast of the nation.
Even with a military-like response, it feels as though we are waging a multiple-front war: the battle on the surface to keep oil off our beaches now and a mainly hidden enemy below the ocean.
How much this enemy can be contained is a matter that only time will tell. Every day that our beaches remain unsoiled is a victory and every day that our fishermen continue to be able to work is a blessing.
Even after the leak itself is capped, our definition of “normal” might have to change. Pristine cannot be pristine once soiled. Locally, fishermen and tourism-related businesses might not survive. For those whose livelihoods have been so impacted, normal may never be normal again.
No amount of cleaning up will change that.
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