{"id":1297,"date":"2010-04-28T02:07:41","date_gmt":"2010-04-28T09:07:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=1297"},"modified":"2010-04-28T02:07:41","modified_gmt":"2010-04-28T09:07:41","slug":"stop-baby-stop","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2010\/04\/28\/stop-baby-stop\/","title":{"rendered":"Stop, Baby, Stop!"},"content":{"rendered":"

This is the worst way we could have proven that we do not have the the technology or expertise to expand offshore drilling.<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\"gulfoilslick\"<\/a> The Gulf of Mexico oil rig disaster will develop into one of the worst spills in US history if the well is not sealed, the coast guard officer leading the response warned.<\/p>\n

British Petroleum, which leases the Deepwater Horizon platform, has been operating four robotic submarines some 1,500 meters (5,000 feet) down on the seabed to try to cap two leaks in the riser pipe that connected the rig to the wellhead.<\/p>\n

But the best efforts of the British energy giant have yielded no progress so far<\/strong>, and engineers are frantically constructing a giant dome that could be placed over the leaks as a back-up plan to try and stop the oil spreading.<\/p>\n

Time is running out as a huge slick with a 600-mile (965-kilometer) circumference has moved within 21 miles of the ecologically fragile Louisiana coast<\/strong> despite favorable winds. Photos released by U.S. space agency NASA revealed the spread had become so great, it was visible from space<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The US authorities said they were considering a controlled burn of oil captured in inflatable containment booms floating in the gulf to protect the shorelines of Louisiana and other southern states.<\/p>\n

"I am going to say right up front: the BP efforts to secure the blowout preventer have not yet been successful," Rear Admiral Mary Landry told a press conference, referring to a 450-tonne machine that could seal the well.<\/p>\n

Asked to compare the accident to the notorious 1989 Exxon Valdez oil tanker disaster, Landry declined but said: "If we don’t secure the well, yes, this will be one of the most significant oil spills in US history<\/strong>."\u2026 [emphasis added<\/em>]<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Inserted from <Raw Story<\/a>><\/p>\n

To give you an idea of the scale, the oil slick is currently larger than West Virginia.  There is little to be done about the drilling operations underway, but no more should be allowed.<\/font><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This is the worst way we could have proven that we do not have the the technology or expertise to expand offshore drilling. The Gulf of Mexico oil rig disaster will develop into one of the worst spills in US history if the well is not sealed, the coast guard officer leading the response warned. […]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1297","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","category-5-id","post-seq-1","post-parity-odd","meta-position-corners","fix"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1297","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1297"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1297\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1297"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1297"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1297"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}