Entries by Michael Guerin

A Canadian woman, Ms Freele, was attacked by a bear in the middle of the night at a US campsite. She awoke just before the bear bit her on here are and then leg. At first Ms Freele was screaming but that just seemed to make the attack worse. She regained her composure and played dead. That did the trick, almost immediately the bear let go. Another man was attacked, possibly by the same bear but that isn't yet known. He wasn't so lucky as his attack was fatal another man was injured as well.

The male survivor, thought to be a teenager, suffered puncture wounds on his calf. The names and ages of the male victims have not been released yet.

Wildlife officials were trying to capture the bear or bears with baited traps, if the right bear(s) is caught it will be killed.

You have heard of the 'A Whale' but have you heard of the 'Big Gulp'?

'The Big Gulp,' is the invention of Lee Dragna, the president of LAD Services, a Morgan City barge builder.

Prompted by his son to 'Fix' the oil problem so they could go fishing again, Lee Dragna set about designing a skimmer.

Lee Dragna teamed up with James Cashman, who runs a worldwide fleet of barges and together the built the first A Gulp on with their own money.

Dragna actually got through to BP via the phone hotline number and things took off from there.

After spending millions on the idea it finally got its test run for BP and it quickly proved itself worthy... unlike the A Whale which flopped.

BP has now paid for seven more barges, three Big Gulps and four smaller barges, dubbed 'Little Gulps.

The Big Gulp is now collecting 5000 barrels of oil per day.

The skimmer is a barge pushed by a tug. So it can maneuver really well and can also enter fairly shallow water. It also has the advantage that it can successfully skim oil in seas at least 6 foot tall. The barge skimmer has turtle excluder devices and fish can easily escape from the first hold the water enters via some sort of vortex exit???

Eventually the water is separated from the oil and results in 98% oil mixture. Pretty good!

Containment Cap Off
They have removed the containment cap to replace it with the new cap. This will take a few days.

First they have to remove the cap. DONE.
Then they have to removed the cut flange. DOING NOW!
Then they have to put a strap on the two pipes that will be sticking up through the top of the BOP. Then they will put on another flange.
Then they will put on a huge series of valves and such.
Then they will test and pressure test the well.
This will tell them how much oil is coming out and the condition of the well bore to some extent.
Then they will hook up and start collecting oil.

So during the time oil will be gushing out the top. But soon before this is finished they should get the Helix Producer online and it will start taking oil. It will likely take about 8k barrels a day initially as it ramps up to 20-25 barrels a day.

So as we speak more oil is being spewed into the GOM because the Enterprise is now not collecting oil. But homefully by tomorrow the Helix Producer will replace that volume lost and then actually surpass it. At that time volume collected will jump up to 8K barrles a day more than what was being collected at anytime in the past from this well.

Also the skimming is going full bore because the seas are calm now and the A Whale is doing another test and should be pulling out a bunch of oil now that the seas aren't 9 foot tall.

Also a blimp has been deployed an it is now being used to direct skimmers which should help them be more efficient.

Update:
Update

Once the containment stack is in place they will close of the flow of oil completely. No oil will be contained via the Helix Producer or the Q4000 at that time.

High pressure = Good news. (9000) I believe.
Low pressure = Bad news.

Low pressure would be bad news because that would mean that the oil is escaping into the ground out of the well bore due to a rupture.

If high pressure is recorded then there is the distinct possibility that they will leave the well shut in and not collect any oil.

This pressure test is expected to last 48 hours.

Update: Pressure test is on going and will hopefully only end when they kill the well.

Catch and release rule which would have allowed fishing in closed areas in Louisiana has been reversed. Why because the government is full of idiots. It is as plane and simple as that. At the meeting it was plane to see that politics and money had a big part in the decision to close it all back down after getting recreational fishermans hope up.

Calm weather has allowed BP/Unified command to move forward. Helix producer should be online Sunday. Then in a few more days the Tosia Picses will come online after they replace the cap with a new different cap.

With the Helix coming online and the enterprise going offline the amount of oil released and not captured should actually go down a bit as the Helix producer can capture more oil than the enterprise.

Once the new cap is in place total capacity going to 4 different places (two off a split in the riser and one of the choke and one of the kill lines) should give plenty enough capacity so virtually no oil is not captured.

Crews search for a black bear in Red River Gorge in Kentucky which has remained closed since the attack. The Gorge area of Daniel Boone National Forest was closed Monday and is to remained closed until further notice.

Dobey said trapping for the bear will continue Wednesday and Thursday. The Forest Service will decide in the next day or two whether to reopen the area if the bear has not been caught.

Both traditional culvert bear traps as well as foothold snares have been deployed baited with doughnuts and honey buns.

If a bear is caught it will be checked for identifying marks and claws checked for human dna possibly.

Scott, the man attacked was standing on a ledge with his blue heeler dog on a retractable leash. When Scott turned, he said, the black bear was standing on the trail.

Scott took several pictures of the bear, which closed in on him. He tried to fight it off, but it was not deterred. Then, luckily two couples who had been hiking showed up. Anthony Gobel began hitting the bear with a tree branch while yelling at the bear. Aspillaga joined in and stopped the bear from dragging Scott further into the woods.

The bear backed down then the four hikers helped Scott back to the trail head, and Aspillaga said the bear followed them for about half-mile.

As my wife Holly and I loaded up for our trip to Grand Isle, there was a feeling that things were now DIFFERENT, that things had changed. After all that is why I was heading to Grand Isle, to see what was different... what had changed. I made the comment as we drove down La. 1 that this was the first time in my entire life that I had been to Grand Isle and didn't bring my fishing pole. Yes, change was in the air and the uncertainty of what we would find ... what had changed was weighing heavily on my mind.

As we drove, Hwy 1 and 308 looked pretty much the same. Familiar curves and businesses were still there as well as a new or possibly forgotten building or two. But looming large up ahead was a BIG change. La. 1 has a new bridge over Bayou Lafourche and a new toll to go with it. That was different. I have been fishing more toward the Cocodrie area in recent years and so this was my first trip over the new bridge.

As we would soon find out, a lot of Grand Isle has changed and a lot remains the same.
Along with this change comes new lingo. Pom Poms now have a dual meaning. Tiger boom no longer refers just to what happens in Tiger Stadium on Saturday nights during football season. Now we have Sandboni's (a beach cleaning version of a Zamboni on a hockey rink), directional boom, hard boom, sorbent boom, drum skimmers, floatels, swabbers and a host of other oil cleanup terminology vying for the limited parking space in my brain.

Once I arrived, I was greeted by Robert Kretzer of BP. No horns and pitchfork - I checked. What I discovered about the BP personnel who are working on the cleanup operation was actually encouraging. Robert, like myself and many of you who grew up in Louisiana, shares the same love of the Louisiana outdoors that you and I do. In fact, all of the BP personnel working on the cleanup volunteered for these jobs. So they are pretty gung-ho and passionate about doing the job and doing it right.

I also learned that they are handicapped in a number of ways that you and I aren't. I don't know the legality of it but when I go fishing I don't bring a bathroom with me - but I do go to the bathroom if you know what I mean. Not so if you work on the cleanup. It's not allowed. You are going to have to stop whatever you are doing and get transported to a bathroom facility, which wastes a lot of time and gas.

Maybe it is just me but I think cleaning up the oil should take precedence over halting your work for something that will take about a minute. That is one of the more comical restrictions they are working under. Others regulations have a bigger effect such as the type of boom they are allowed to deploy on Grand Isle itself or not being allowed access to certain places to do cleanup. There are reasons for these restrictions and I don't mean to imply that all should be lifted. That is certainly not the case. This is more of just a commentary on how huge companies generally have a set of rules and regulations you must follow and common sense isn't allowed to suspend those rules. Enter Mr. Red Tape and the process of trying to work with it.

Getting back to the cleanup and what exactly BP is doing, or should I say paying for, I should mention that this command center on Grand Isle is just a small part of the overall cleanup effort in terms of personnel. Their area of command runs from Bell Pass east all the way to the Eastern side of Barataria Bay.

The first line of defense in detecting oil moving toward the area is spotter aircraft and spotter boats, which we saw zipping around out past the surf watching for signs of oil.

Skimmers working in the open gulf can be directed to the oil by these spotters and hopefully collect it all before it has a chance to impact the beach or marsh areas. But as happens every night, the sun goes down and the Incident Command Operation loses its ability to see. This, of course, make their job harder.

Kretzer explained how the Island is broken down into half mile segments and that on the previous night two of those sections received some oil impact. There are crews assigned to all of the beaches from Fourchon on East and as soon as oil is spotted on the morning recon, crews are dispatched to clean it up. Beaches are cleaned immediately and no oil remains on any of the beaches for very long.

The next line of defense comes in the passes. Directional boom is laid out in the passes to funnel the oil to collection spots, where it is either suctioned up or trapped in absorbent material.

Once in the marsh the plan of attack is to protect with boom where possible. In places where the oil has already impacted the marsh, BP places sorbent boom to catch the oil as the tide recedes and washes it out of the marsh. BP is not allowed to access the marsh to clean it due to erosion concerns. They can only go up to the edge of the marsh grass and no further.

This entire Incident Command Cleanup engine is, in my opinion, going to pretty much handle any oil that comes through now that they have reached this level of presence in the Grand Isle area. Most of the affected marsh was saturated with oil before mechanisms were in place to deal with it. This cleanup engine was not put in place overnight and it isn't a stagnant process. They are constantly improving and adding and changing.

I guess in an ideal world this would have been put in place day one. But in the real world you can't snap your fingers and have people trained and hired and cleaning up and deploying boom all in an instant. Sand Dollar Marina is a hustling bustling port of activity. Supplies and new boom are arriving daily ... and being deployed daily. Change is happening fast and constantly.

When I called Kretzer to let him know we were close, he told me to turn on Walnut Lane just before the water tower. The Incident Command Center had moved to new building while I was driving down! Another interesting event that shows how dynamic the situation is down there was that the area of command changed while we were out taking a tour of Elmer's Island and Queen Bess Island. At the end of the day, the Grand Isle Incident Command's area of operation boundary moved slightly westward and ceded the Jimmys Bay area to the Lafitte Incident Command center.

Overall, I would have to say that Grand Isle and the surrounding area will be well protected now that they have the equipment and processes in place to deal with the oil. But I tell you what I saw was heartbreaking and mad me mad. Wherever we went, the fish were jumping, the birds were diving on baitfish, porpoises were rolling in the pass ... and nobody is allowed to fish because you might catch one that was pulled through some oil. Not that I saw any.

The damage done by the oil spill is out there and its full effect will not be known for some time - after all, the oil is still flowing. But I can say that the damage to the economy due to the shutdown of drilling and the shutdown of recreational fishing and commercial fishing is doing a lot more damage than anything the government thinks they are protecting. Yes, some areas need to be closed but what the federal government is doing with their heavy handed bans and moratoriums is analogous to slicing off your hand so that you don't cut your finger.
We survived Katrina and Rita and we'll survive this. It is just frustrating when overzealous government regulation is making the matter far worse than it already is.

The residents and camp owners on Grand Isle Louisiana are a bit upset with the current state of affairs as you might imagine. The BP oil spill has been a real inconvenience to them. Nobody owns property on Grand Isle, Louisiana's only inhabited barrier island, unless they have a deep love for the beach, fishing and crabbing.

Well the Deepwater Horizon oil leak has the beaches shut down and the fishing and crabbing off limits until the oil that continues to work its way to shore is dealt with. Steep fines await those that get caught violating the fishing ban.

The island however is not a deserted ghost town as you might imagine. Instead it is a hustling and bustling place with people scurrying all over the island and the surrounding waters. Except this year is different. Instead of everyone carrying a fishing pole, they are carrying shovels and boom and other relief worker implements.

Some of the "regulars" have decided to show their displeasure with the whole situation by displaying signs and such, directed at one company and sometimes one man within that company. I can only imagine how heartbreaking and disheartening it would be if I worked for BP and had to drive by these signs ever day as I moved around the island trying to clean up the mess.

For lack of a better phrase... scroll down and enjoy.

Pat Thomas, general curator for the Wildlife Conservation Society's Bronx Zoo in New York, one day decided to get scientific the scents they use with their big cats to ward off boredom. Pat began testing 24 fragrances. Pat Thomas recorded how long it took the big cats to notice the scent and how much time they spent interacting with it.

The results 'Obsession for Men triumphed' was the most intoxicating to the big cats at the zoo. The big cats 'found it interesting' for 11.1 minutes.

Roan Balas McNab, a Wildlife Conservation Society program director in Guatemala, has been using Obsession for Men since 2007 to help study the elusive jaguars in the Maya Biosphere Reserve. Studying suck a ghost like creature was, and is hard. Roan has only incountered a jaguar by chance once in 14 years of working on the reserve!!!

Calvin Klein's 'Obsession for Men' to the rescue.

Roan relies on trail cameras for much of his research.

After learning of the Pat Thomas's test, Mr. McNab's field biologists began spraying Obsession for Men near their cameras. They would spray the cologne onto a rag tied to a stake in the ground. Post Calvin Klein thee times as many of the cats walked by camera stands spiked with the cologne than those without it. Not only did they get more pictures but also the jaguars stayed around longer giving the researchers a much better glimps into the lives of the elusive big cat of the jungle.

That diversion gave researchers the chance to get clear, full shots of the jaguars and their spot patterns.

So there you have it. Jaguars prefer 'Obession for Men' two to one over other cologne's! Not sure how effective it would be on Cougars! haha

Media reports of top kill success where premature. BP said that it had stopped pumping drilling mud into the well at 11 p.m. Wednesday to assess the results of the first phase of the top kill, monitor the pressure in the well and restock the vessels bringing in mud for the operation. Doug Suttles, BP's chief operating officer, said BP pumping would start again later this evening (27th and would continue for at least another 24 hours.

Oil continues to flow. "We have successfully pumped some of the drilling mud into the well bore. Clearly we need to pump more of that in."

Mr. Suttles said BP was expecting to have to deploy a "junk shot," which will allow them to pump against some back pressure and hopefully be able to send more mode down the well instead of out the riser leaks.

Top Kill and Junk Shot fail to stop leak. BP unable to build enogh back pressure to force oil far enough down the well to equalize the pressure.

BP has begun preperations for top hat which involves removing the failed riser off the top of the bop and hooking up the top hat to the top of the riser.

If all goes well they will be able to collect most of the oil spewing from the well.


Update:
Well like everything else all is not going well.

The diamond wire (cutting part) got stuck in the cut late last night. Hours trying to work it free or get it restarted didn't work. Those efforts included, at one point, reattaching the shears to the cut end of the pipe so we could readadjust the sling angle on our A&R winch.

They will send the shears back down and cut the riser right below the kink.

Ultimately, we want a really clean cut on the riser because the latest version of the top hat is designed to actually seal on the riser so we can contain as much of the flow as possible. But that isn't going to happen. The diamond wire saw is off the table. Shears will be used and an alternate top hat will be used.


So, after the shear cut is complete - The diamond saw will cut it.

Update:
Pipe was sheared this morning then cleaned up a bit. BP wanted to continue with the diamond saw but the coast guard over ruled. Top Hat/dome has been placed on the top of the BOP. Oil is only very slowly being collected right now. It will be morning before we have any real idea on how successful the cap will be.

Update:
BP is collecting about 6000 BPD from the top hat. More is likely as time goes by and flow is optimized and increased.

Update:
Top hat is recovering at a rate of just over 14,500 barrels per day now. They are at the rated capacity of the production ship.

BP says they are committed to restoring the Gulf Coast. As one step, revenue from recovered oil will go to new wildlife fund.

Production rig will replace the ship weeks from now and it will have a higher production capability.

In a week BP hopes to be also capturing oil from the choke and kill lines. This oil will go up to a different ship through a different riser.

Subsurface sampling is being done. Just the very limited early results are back. NOAA’s analysis of the presence of subsurface oil determined that the concentration of hydrocarbons is in the range of LESS than 0.5 parts per million, and PAH levels in range of parts per trillion. PAH stands for Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon.

Update:
The Q4000 (ship) is being retrofitted to collect, process and dispose of 10,000 barrels a day. This is in addition to the Enterprise's capacity. Combined they expect to be able to potentially collect 28,000 barrels of oil per day.

The Q4000 will, unlike the Enterprise, burn the oil it collects along with the natural gas.

BP says they are committed to restoring the Gulf Coast. As one step, revenue from recovered oil will go to new wildlife fund.

Update:
Work on the first relief well, which started May 2, continues and has currently reached a depth of 13,978 feet. The second relief well, which started May 16, is at 8,576 feet,

Top hat is recovering at a rate of about 16,000 barrels per day.

The Q4000 is being retrofitted to burn 10,000 barrels a day from the choke and kill lines.

Toisa Pisces: The 304 ft. Toisa Pisces is expected to arrive June 19th. At that time BP will replace the current containment cap with a tighter-fitting cap connected to a riser pipe that will go to the Toisa Pisces. Most if not all of the leaking oil will be contained by this method ship as it has a much higher daily capacity.

Update:
This is getting downright ridiculous. Laugh or cry it is your choice.

Last night the Enterprise had an alarm trigger due to a faulty sensor that resulted in a shutdown of operations. Then again today a suspected lightning strike caused a small fire aboard the Enterprise, resulting in a second temporary shutdown of oil collection operations.

The good news is the fire was quickly extinguished and collection operations should be again operational. I am told by BP that it will not take as long to ramp up production now that they have the past working conditions to shoot for.

From midnight to noon on 6/15, approx. 5,610 barrels of oil collected. Way down due to the shutdowns.

Update: For the last 12 hours on June 16th (noon to midnight), approximately 7,710 barrels of oil were collected and approximately 2,600 barrels of oil and 22 million cubic feet of natural gas were flared.

Pre Q4000 BP was at ~15.5K. This current rate is
20,620 barrels a day collected or burned. Here is to hoping they can continue to increase the burn rate on the Q4000 and get this figure up to 25K or more.

53 days behind schedule: The Obama administration has finally decided to allow the Netherlands to send in its skimmers to help clean up the mess. US tankers that are heading to the site with four pairs of skimming booms airlifted from the Netherlands and should be collecting oil at the flow site within days.

Imagine how much oil they could have collected had their offer been accepted initially. Imagine how much less land and marsh would have never been impacted by oil. The skimmers can collect a heck of a lot more oil than the shrimp boats pulling boom.

I haven't added many new news stories since the oil leak began but I am updating the oil leak post regularly. Just scroll down to the oil leak post and breaking news stories are tagged on to the end with the date of each update clearly displayed.

On May 1, 2010 a trail cam took a photo of a cougar in a rural area east of Bloomfield, Indianaa. Biologist Scott Johnson had set up the camera in the area where a deer carcass had been found buried under a pile of leaves. Four pictures were taken all together.

It is not know if this cougar is male or female, just that it appears to be in its prime. It is not know if it is traveling through the area or is a resident. And it is not know if it is a former captive are not.

The story starts of horribly and keeps getting worse. First the Deepwater Horizon was capping a newly drilled well Southeast of Venice when a blowout occurred. For reasons I still do not know the cutoff valves did not and have not activated to shut off the flow.

The blowout was immediately followed by an explosion that killed 11 men who's bodies still have not been found.

The rig burned and then a day or so later sank in 5000 feet of water.

The U.S. Coast Guard did a planned test burn of some of the oil within fire resistant buoys. I do not know if the results were promising or not and I have heard that the water is now to rough to conduct any more burns.

42,000 gallons was originally reported to be leaking daily. That figure has been revised up since it was first reported more than a week ago. It is unclear if the original amount was low or if the new estimates of as much as 5 times that amount are the result of an increase in flow possibly due to restrictions to the flow being eroded away.

ROV's have failed in several attempts to plug the well or close the valves located on the seafloor that are designed to prevent this release from happening. Some well are built with 500 thousand dollar valves that can be operated remotely... even from shore. Sadly these were not used on this well.

Now the Northern Gulf Coast is facing what could turn out to be the worst environmental disaster the US has ever had.

There is still hope that the ROV's will be able to activate the blowout valves. I believe the problem is that the ROV's have not been able to build enough pressure to close the valves. New larger lines were being fabricated. I do not know if this is still in the works or not.

A relief well is being drilled but that will take about 2 months before it can stop the flow. It will take more than a month for a huge undersea umbrella to be deployed that could funnel the oil to the surface where it would be pumped into a tanker. But this has never been done before in water more than 200 feet deep and this well is in 5000 foot of water.

The oil is unfortunately not the kind of oil that usually occurs off the Louisiana coast. Early test show that about half or more of the oil is not suitable for cars but instead for asphalt. This means that the dispersants do not work well on it. The good new is that it is pretty non-toxic. The bad news again is that the oil is like roofing tar and will stick to whatever it touches.

It is expected that the oil will come ashore as tarballs and not as an oil slick like happened with the Valdez. This might make cleanup on sand beaches relatively easy. But wherever there is marsh the clean up will be next to impossible.

After having favorable winds the weather has now turned for the worse and the oil is reportedly reaching the marshes at the mouth of the Mississippi River right now.

The oil slick is now huge encompassing and are of more than 100 miles long and 45 miles wide and growing.

Update #1 May 2:
Louisiana has largely been spared so far from the oil. The Gulf is like a river and it flows from West to East here. As far as I can tell oil doesn't flow up stream very well. Also we have the Mississippi river pushing out and the level is high and getting higher which means more and more current heading away from shore.

We just went through a number of days of sustained winds of 35 miles per hour blowing out of the Southeast. Pretty much the worst weather we can expect. The seas are beginning to lay down now and La. just received a very small taste of what was feared. We just may have taken natures best shot at hitting Louisiana with this oil.

But what is good for Louisiana may not be so good for Alabama and Florida. Time will tell. This is just my speculation at this point.

Update #2 May 3:


There is more good news today. The winds and seas are laying down more and more and the oil recovery and containment efforts will be able to be implemented again. Dispersants are being injected straight into the oil streams (three places) where it is leaking out and the area of heavy oil is actually getting smaller.

So it looks like all the gulf states may be spared for the most part. I have no doubt that you will see some oil probably in the form of tarballs hit the beach somewhere but that with any luck will be the exception rather than the rule.

For those of you that are from other states let me clarify something. Your coverage is likely coming from the big news outlets. Make no mistake those people are freaking idiots. Don't believe a thing they say. They are just looking for a story and don't know what the hell they are talking about.

You will likely be bombarded with pictures of dead animal on the beach, birds being cleaned of oil etc etc. Well they have video of one bird being cleaned and it is shown over and over and over again. Why only the one because the environmental catastrophe they have been reporting on has largely not happened.. at least not yet.

The dead turtle they will or have shown on the beach was probably killed by a shrimper or a shark and not the oil. If they want to show picture of dead animals and fish on the Louisiana coast they can do that every single day of the year whether there is an oil spill or leak or not.

If wildlife was being severely impacted they would have tons of footage of it. The news reporters are paying good money to be taken by locals to see birds in oil or just oil. Well I haven't seen any of that footage yet, because they are not able to get that footage... why because it doesn't exist at this point in time.

Trust me if they do show any footage of oil on the beach or marsh just know that that is the very worst thing they can find and it is the exception rather than the rule.

We are not out of the woods yet but lets not all jump the gun and say the sky is falling when it hasn't and hopefully won't.

Update #3 May 4th:

BP is building dome stuctures out of coffer dams left over from after hurricane Katrina. The first is built and is being tested and could possibly be in place this Friday. The first dome will encapsulate the largest of the three leaks and if all goes as planed could allow the capture of 85% of the oil that is leaking out.

The satelitte images of the oil slick which only shows the heavily fouled surface areas shows that the recovery and dispersant efforts are being somewhat successful. But although this is the lesser of two evils the dispersants do not magically make the oil disappear. The oil that is successfully dispersed will move with the ocean currents and eventually be diluted and then decompose.

Another piece of bad news although not unexpected is that the fishing bans that now extend across much of the Northern Gulf Coast East of the Mississippi River will remain closed for a unknown length of time after the oil leak has been stopped. Nobody knows how long this will be. Even the experts caould only venture a guess... which they wont.

The ban will only be lifted after test show that the fishery is free of residual contamination. The known extent of that right now is very small but it is anyones guess as to how much the wildlife will be effected. Many species can simply swim to avoid the oil but it is not know how may will do this and how much wildlife will simply swim straight into it or become trapped by the oil.

But currently the mood is hopeful and optimistic.

Update #4 May 5:
As some of you may know a number of dead sea turtles have washed up on the beach. The big media outlets wasted no time in putting up the pictures of the dead turtles to run with all there doom and gloom stories on the end of the world due to the oil leak. Well the turtles have examined inside and out and not a single one of the 10 examined showed any signs that the oil leak had anything to do with it. But it is of course to late, the damage is done, now the whole world has seen the dead turtles beneath the headlines of the oil leak.

Oh and today a pelican that was contaminated with oil was cleaned. This makes a grand total of TWO birds that have been cleaned. So I guess the media was right after all the end of the world is near. I would laugh at their stupidity if it wasn't for the fact that their stupidity is costing a whole lot of people money.

Also today some of the oil was suppose to be boomed and burned and one of the smaller leaks was plugged although it has had no real effect on the amount of oil being release. Probably because the pressure will bump up slightly at the other leaks and they will basically let out what oil would have gone out the plugged hole.

Of course morons on the internet never can keep their stupid ideas and comments to theirself. On twitter people were asking why they even bothered to waste time plugging the hole if it would have no effect!!!

Well idiot, when the other two leaks have the oil recovery domes put in place there will no longer be any oil leaking into the gulf. If this leak wasn't plugged then duh it would still be leaking oil into the gulf.

Oh and now through the next few days may be a great opportunity to book a condo on the gulf coast. With all the people canceling their beach plan's you might be able to get a killer deal.

Update #5 May 7:
Containment device is either in place or hovering just above it final resting spot. Once it is in place piping will then be connected to the dome and oil will hopefully be recovered shortly thereafter.

I believe that undersea dispersant operations have been halted. This will allow more oil to reach the surface but with the calmer seas it should also allow that oil to be potentially contained and recovered or burned which doesn't happen when the oil is disperesed. Toxicity of the dispersants has also been a question raised by concerned citizens. Aireal application continues I believe, probably mostly on new oil where it is most effective and where it isn't already contained.

People should also be aware that their is no real threat to you from eating contaminated seafood. The health effects or basically no existant. The threat is that the seafood will taste bad. Closures occur to prevent bad tasting seafood from reaching the market, not because it will be harmful or toxic.

Update #6 May 8:
The first attempt at using the containment dome failed miserably. It has been moved off of the leak for now will they consider their options. The methane gas coming out of the leak is turning into ice and plugs up the piping that is suppose to bring the oil to the ship above.

Unless someway of heating up the piping and dome can be found this looks like it might be a dead end.

Other more risky options are now being considered such as putting various objects and products into the piping to try to slow the flow.

The next step has not been decided. Pray for some good news soon.

Update #7 May 11:
The second containment dome has been deployed into the Gulf of Mexico but has not yet been positioned over the leak. And with good reason. This second dome is much different from the first. It isn't a static box that just sits there. If it were it wouldn't work just like the first one didn't work.

This time around the smaller dome (5'x 4') has other features that are currently being tested to make sure everything is operational before it is put in place on the leak.

Methanol water, a warm water jacket, and the immediate pumping operation in place and ready to go when it is placed over the leak are going to be required for the Top Hat to have any chance of success.

We should know if it is working some time tomorrow (Thursday) when it will be put in place over the leak.

About in two weeks BP will have what is called Top Kill aka Junk Shot ready to go. BP feels that this option has a very good chance of success if it can be implemented. It is a long used option that has been used in Kuwait and other places.

What Top Kill is is golf balls, cut up rubber of various sizes are shot into the BOP an that stuff flows toward the leak and plugs up the piping. Then as the pressure equalizes and the flow of oil and gas slows or stops drill mud and then concrete are pumped into the bop which flows mostly back in the piping under ground to seal and cement the leak. Totally killing the flow of oil.

Until they can configure the bop to take both the junk shot and the mud and cement we can't do either. This would normally be a capability they would have right away but the destruction of the oil rig prevents the normal operation of the BOP. Modefications of a control model are being done right now so that the Top Kill can be executed.

Update #8 May 13:

As of this morning's report some 97,000 barrels of oily liquid have now been recovered. Not new news but oh well.

BP estimates oil burned so far amounts to 13,000 barrels of oil (a barrel is 42 gallons).

Here is a quote from BP:
'Efforts to recover oil through the riser tube intervention should occur by the weekend. I'm not sure of the precise sequencing of the attempts to use the riser tube and top hat. There're no mechanical issues that I am aware of with the top hat. We are working several of the solutions in parallel and will report the results.'


Update #9 May 16:

BP tried to capture some of the flow of oil Friday night but ran into trouble when something shifted and they had to retrieve the insertion tube to make modifications. BP was a bit vague on what exactly went wrong.

Saturday night BP was successful in getting the insertion tube inserted into the pipe but it late came out. Possibly due to pressure build up in the riser??? Or possibly due to the insertion tube acting like a jet nozzle when the gas under tremendous pressure from the depth expanded in the tube leading to the drill ship??? Both of those explanations are just my thoughts.

The tube has since be reinserted. Prior to the tube being blown out of the riser BP was able to capture some of the flow. The tube has since been reinserted and oil recovery efforts are underway.

The ship is basically a floating oil rig. The gas will be flared like some rigs regularly do and the oil will be collected in the ships holds. Hope to hear good news soon.

It was theorized by BP that they would be able to capture 75% of the oil using this method. Of course that is subject to change as this has never been tried at any depth and the amount of oil flowing out is unknown and the amount of entrained gas in the oil is also unknown.

Update #10 May 17:


The oil slick in the Gulf of Mexico has been partially suck into the Loop Current. This current which you can think of as fast flowing river in the Gulf of Mexico will quickly pull this oil towards the Southern tip of Florida where it passes between Florida and Cuba.

It has been widely reported that the riser insertion tube is sucking up 1/5th of the oil that has been leaking into the gulf. This is incorrect. The estimate of oil has officially been pegged at about 5000 barrels per day. This is just a guess and not a very solid one. Others have estimated the flow to be much much higher.

So what is important is to note that less oil is making its way into the gulf because of the riser insertion tube success. But we do not know how much of the flow it will be able to capture. If the leak is at 20,000 barrels a day then 1000 barrels capture only reduces the flow by 1/20th. So we need to know how much of the flow percentage wise is being captured at this juncture not the number of barrels per day.

Also BP is slowly increasing the amount of oil they are capturing out of the riser. This is because if they just went full bore they might clog up the entire system with hydrates and have to start all over again. By progressing slowly they can hopefully recognize when they are starting to suck up to much sea water and then throttle the flow back. We will know more in a day or so.
Update #11 May 20:
Riser insertion tube now collecting 3000 barrels of oil per day. Kevin Costner back group sending 10 oil skimmers to Louisiana for a test. About 20 more skimmers could follow if successful. The largest of these "oil vacuum cleaners could each collect about 686 barrels of oil each day. Possibly more depending on weather and oil conditions.

Update #12 May 24:
Leak is still spewing oil. Top Kill is scheduled to be performed Wednesday by BP. The Top Kill and or Junk Shot if needed has been pushed back continually.

A whole lot of anger has been directed towards BP lately as frustration grows on this leak not being stopped already. I do not hear anyone professionally criticizing BP for not doing some other form of leak stoppage. BP has so far not denied any claims. Many are still pending but so far none have been denied. I believe some of those claims are fraudulent that BP has paid.

I also believe that BP will not pursue fraud or deny fraudulent claims unless they are very blatant due to the possibility of negative media publicity it could entail... even when they are right.

BP is without a doubt the responsible party. BP cause this leak. Be made at them for that. But the frustration directed at them on stopping the leak I believe is misguided. When it is all said a done it will most likely be shown that BP could have stopped this earlier had they done X,Y or Z. But that is inevitable when dealing with something like this. I believe BP is doing the best they can to stop this leak... and obviously it is in their best interest.

But let me tell you where your anger should be directed. At the federal government. They are partially responsible for the accident happening in the first place. They did not do their job as it is defined. I am not going to get into the particulars here but the fell down on the job of doing their responsibilities before the accident occurred.

Also and even worse in my opinion is their short coming in dealing with the oil response. 70 miles of Louisiana coast has now been impacted by the oil. It is a shame to say that a large percentage of that damage to wetlands could have been prevented if it wasn't for the bureaucratic red tape of the corps permitting process.

ONE sand berm has been completed along the Louisiana coast by the national guard. I am speaking of Elmers Island. A sand barrier was built and in front of it is boom, absorbant boom and something called pompoms. The oil has made its way past all of the barriers and onto the sand barrier but not beyond. Oil on a beach can simply be scooped up like cat piss in a litter box. But when the oil makes it to the marshes it is like cleaning, oil from a living rug. Well living for a while anyway.

The Governor of Louisiana, Bobby Jindal, has been trying to get the Corps to issue an emergency dredging permit to build sand berms to protect the marsh. The red tape still has this project delayed. So while the stupid ass federal government looks at whether this is a good idea or not the wetlands that the corps process is suppose to protect are being needlessly killed due to their inaction.

Be pissed at that!!!

Approval will likely come in a couple more days, after weeks of waiting. Wouldn't it be ironic if approval is granted the same day they plug the leak. Time line looks favorable for that to actually happen.

To little to late! Direct you anger at the Feds they are as much to blame for the actual damage as BP.

Following closely on the heals of the Polar Bear/Grizzly Bear cross is a picture of a pig/sheep cross that is sweeping across the internet.

As you can see in the picture below the mystery animal has the hair of a sheep but the body of a russian boar. So is this animal really a cross or is it yet another hoax in a long line of hoaxes readily propegated on the internet? Actually it isn't either a hoax or a pig/sheep cross. It turns out is is a mangalista hog!



The photo is real but just like so many things you see and read about on the internet this one was only half true. The story line, a pig/sheep cross was wrong but the picture is authentic.

Mangalista hogs or simply a hog that has been breed over the years to have the thick wool like hair of a sheep to help it better survive the harsh winters of Austria and Hungary. You are only now seeing it in pictures because of the world shrinking powers of the internet.

This and other pictures of a mangalista hog may be getting more common on the internet but the mangalista hogs are not. They produce less meat than other commercially raised pigs so they are becoming increasingly rare.

Second Polar Bear/Grizzly cross is it called a "pizzly" or "grolar"? Take your pick. Either name will do. An Inuit hunter on Victoria Island, Northwest Territories, Canada killed the apparent hybrid. Canadian wildlife authorities have investigating the bear, which has a polar bear-like head but also shows brown bear features. DNA has proven it to be a hybrid.

This country (USA) was set up to be a country of governed by laws... not by individuals. People are elected or appointed to uphold the laws. It really is a great system... or at least was until the morals of this country took a nosedive... until politics became carrier instead of a part time temporary job.

You may ask yourself, "What they heck is this doing here?" This is suppose to be about hunting and fishing and other such things. Well I will tell you. Currently there is a member of the State Game, Fish and Parks Commission in South Dakota that is CLEARLY there illegally. The law is in black and white and it is really not debatable if it is a violation of the law or not.... unless you are a lawyer or have some mental deficiency that prevents clear logical thinking.

Here are the particulars of the South Dakota situation. But keep in mind this isn't the point of the post just one currently happening example. The law states that a member of the commission can not server for more than 8 years. Here is a quote from the law! "No person shall serve on the commission for more than 8 years."

There you have it. Let me teach you a little trick that I learned when I was about 3 or 4 years old. Pink is a bad color. Is your shirt Pink. Yes. Then it is a bad color.

Pretty complicated I know so reread it a few times and see if you can wrap your brain around the logic. Now lets apply this same logic and see how it works out in the South Dakota case.

"Not more than 8 years." Tim Kessler has now served 17 years. Is 17 more than 8? Yes then Kessler is serving in violation of the law.

Could this be an oversite? No it has been brought to the governors attention and yet Kessler is still on the commission!

People this is clear as day. You are not allowed to server more than 8 years. There is one exception that would allow you to server 10 but that certainly doesn't apply here and even if it did 17 is still bigger than 10.

So why is he still serving. I will give you the OTHER side of the story because there is always an other side. Kessler served two terms (8 years) and then sat out and served again. Supporters of Kessler say the law means that you can only serve 8 consecutive years.

The problem with this logic is the simple matter of the fact that the law does not say that. It says 8 years and you are out. PERIOD. Not a word about consecutively or anything like that.

And that is what is wrong in South Dakota and that is what is wrong with the US Legislature and Judiciary today.

The law is the law and when we don't enforce it we can no longer be called a nation of laws. Unfortunately the South Dakota example is just one of many. I could go on and on. There are many examples of such blatant disregard of the law and unfortunately these occurrences are not limited to wildlife and fisheries.

God help us, because the direction this country is headed is not a good one.