Gulf Oil Leak.....

[Marauderjack]

This video will give you an idea of the MAGNITUDE of this leak!!!:eek:

This is truly a disaster and I hope they can contain it before a tropical storm blows it miles inland not to mention the entire Gulf coastline!!:shake:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pxDf-KkMCKQ

[SC Cheesehead]

30,000+ people working on it, and believe me, they are working their hardest to clean up this mess.

Ask me how I know....

[sailsmen]

There maybe 30,000 people available to work on clean up however they are repeatedly being shut down and under utilized by Inter Gov't squabbling.

Example the Corps of Eng issues a permit and work begins. After a few weeks Wild Life and Fisheries shuts the work down.

Under the Jones Act a foreign vessel cannot go from a USA Port to a USA Port. This makes it very difficult for foreign vessels to come here to help. The President can suspend the Jones Act as has been done in the past.

Under OPA'90 skimmers and booms are required to be stocked in different regions. The Pres could waive or reduce this requirement allowing USA skimmers and readily available boom to be used.

Oil was approaching our coast and this fact was repeatedly relayed to the USCG over a period of several days. The USCG took no action and the oil began to make contact with the beach. The fleet of clean up vessels is under the USCG command.

Local Gov't Officials under disaster authority commanderred the fleet of clean up vessels and began the clean up. The USCG repsonse was to threaten the Local Gov't Officials with arrest.

I can go on and on.

The Pres has the full authority to appoint a Czar with in the USCG who can make every decision and over rule any other Gov't Dept, for what ever reason to date the Pres has not done this.

Under OPA'90 - "The President shall direct all Federal, State, and private actions to remove the discharge or to mitigate or prevent the threat of the discharge."

The Oil Pollution Act of 1990, (OPA'90) applies when there is a discharge of oil onto water. As respects clean up, mitigation and property damage from a discharge of oil, it imposes strict liability, as in regardless of fault, on the vessel owner and/or the lessee, in this case BP.
In exchange for this strict liability there is a cap on the strict liability of $75M, however the cap does not apply to;
1) costs incurred by Federal, State and local Gov't
2) violation of any Federal safety, construction or operating regulation which is the case with BP
3) failure to report the discharge.

The Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund which currently has $1.4 Billion and is funded by a tax on every barrel of oil pays claims that the vessel owner or lessee, BP, have denied to pay or have not paid in 90 days. The National Pollution Funds Center, which is under the USCG, administers the fund. File your claim first with BP. By law if BP denies or does not pay within 90 days file your claim with the NPFC, 202-493-6700, 800-280-7118 or uscg.mil/ccs/npfc. Types of claims OPA'90 covers are loss of profits, loss earning capacity, loss of natural resources, loss of taxes, property damage, etc.

[sailsmen]

"Cut red tape and get more skimming vessels to oil spill: An editorial
Published: Wednesday, June 30, 2010, 6:22 AM Updated: Wednesday, June 30, 2010, 5:07 PM
Editorial page staff, The Times-Picayune

U.S. Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen talks like he understands how crucial skimming vessels are to removing oil from the Gulf of Mexico before it washes ashore.

Jae C. Hong/The Associated PressMore skimming vessels are needed to remove oil from the Gulf of Mexico.
"Skimmers are our critical mass right now,'' he said recently. "We need to put those wherever we can get them. And we want to get them from wherever they are available.''

But Adm. Allen, who is the national incident commander for the oil spill, hasn't backed up those words with action. According to BP's most recent estimate, 433 vessels are collecting oil from the runaway oil well, but only a third of them are designed specifically for oil skimming.

In the meantime, vessels that could be used to clean up the massive amounts of oil are being blocked by a sea of red tape. There are 850 skimmers in the southeast United States and 1,600 nationwide, but the Oil Pollution Act of 1990, which requires regions to maintain levels of equipment such as skimmers, is preventing some resources from coming to the Gulf. The Jones Act, a maritime law designed to promote U.S. shipping interests, is complicating efforts to get foreign boats here.

"It is hard to believe that the response is this anemic,'' Sen. George LeMieux of Florida said on the Senate floor last week. "It is hard to believe that there is this lack of urgency or sense of purpose in getting this done.''

The government isn't alone in showing a lack of urgency. BP has declined an offer from Shell to bring an oil recovery boat that is sitting idle in Alaska to the Gulf. "Nothing would prevent it from working right now in the Gulf of Mexico,'' said Curtis Smith, a Shell spokesman. "It remains available in the event that BP reconsiders.''

BP's refusal to accept help from Shell is frustrating. Doug Suttles, BP America's chief operating officer, told The Times-Picayune last week that the company "threw everything at'' the out-of-control well. But everything apparently doesn't include the Nanuq.

As for the Oil Pollution Act, Adm. Allen says that discussions are going on within the administration about how to free up equipment. That's a change from the admiral's initial position, when he said that leaving other areas vulnerable was one of his biggest concerns. Given the scope of this disaster, it's hard to understand why the government hasn't moved more quickly from discussion to action.

When it comes to the Jones Act, even less is happening. Adm. Allen has promised to process waivers to the act quickly, but so far none have been granted. The admiral has downplayed the effect of the law on the cleanup, but the experience of Ecoceane, a French company with a fleet of skimming boats, suggests that it is an impediment. Eric Vial, the company's president, said it sold nine boats to a Florida contractor so that the Jones Act wouldn't be a factor. Those boats could have been in the Gulf much sooner, he said.

Sens. Kay Bailey Hutchinson and John Cornyn of Texas, along with Sen. LeMieux, have proposed legislation to temporarily waive the Jones Act for oil spill response vessels, and that's a reasonable step in the face of this disaster.

Local officials who have been begging for more skimmers shouldn't have to wait for help because the federal government refused to deal with bureaucratic barriers.

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