BP Spill Threatens to go Global plus Possible Affects on the Foodchain

The more I read about what's going on and the likely repurcussions, the more I get the chills. I found the following article here , couldn't see it posted anywhere else on ATS so here it is in it's entirety...

PS) You might also want to read How Oil Spills Affect the Food Chain

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I've been covering the Gulf oil spill for more than six weeks. Recently, during a national U.S. television interview, I said "BP's Gulf oil spill is a global ecological disaster."

It was no exaggeration. Consider the following: Since April 20, a vast amount of oil has bled into the Gulf of Mexico. According to BP, it's about 750,000 litres a day; researchers at Florida State University estimated about five weeks ago it was at least 3.8 million litres a day; and even more recently engineers from Purdue University estimated it's probably closer to 9.5 million litres a day.

The ominous plumes of oil venting from this pipe at the equivalent of 152 atmospheric pressures -- one mile beneath the surface -- are behaving unlike any other oil spill ever observed before. That is, oil is rising to the surface but in some cases is sinking, just how deep, so far, remains unclear.

Allowing the plumes to naturally disperse has many consequences. Microbes that eat oil require oxygen and they suck it out of the sea, creating oxygen-depletion zones. Crude that washes onshore is deleterious to all life, so thousands of miles of boom have been deployed to prevent it from landing.

In an attempt to break up these massive slicks of oil, BP has used more than 5.3 million litres of Corexit oil dispersant, more than 285,000 litres near the leak site. Dispersant has never been subjected to trials deep in the ocean before.

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I really hope that the crap has not begun to hit the fan in the way it feels like the crap has begun to really hit the fan.

[edit on 12/6/10 by cosmicpixie]

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[edit on 6/12/2010 by semperfortis]

Excellent work. Let me be the first to thank you for this coherent and enlightening report.


Any thoughts or information on the Gulf Coast's chances of recovery, or what kind of efforts would be most efficacious in the near and far future?

reply to post by Copperflower


I didn't write the report myself, I found it on the net and posted it .

It's difficult to gage the potential effects on a long term basis and as I'm not expert in the relevant sciences I can only really speculate from a layman's viewpoint. From what I've read so far and the daily news updates it seems to me that the gulf is likely to turn into something of a dead zone that will take decades to recover from. If the leak is not contained and if the pressure results in other blows via fissures on the sea bed erupting and spewing forth more oil again then the ramifications are frankly quite terrifying. Another freakish scenario is them resorting to using some sort of explosive devices as a last ditched attempt to try and solve the issue - I dread to think what pandora's box THAT might open.

It's really all speculation though at the moment , I don't think we can be sure of anything other than this thing seems to be getting worse, not better. As for containment measures, that subject isn't something I have any knowledge about, I don't really understand it all enough to offer some sort of weighted opinion on the matter. I am just reading the news each day as a concerned spectator to what feels to me to be an event that may well be setting off a whole chain of events too horrific to digest.

How the Spill Could Affect Europe via the Gulf Stream Current

[edit on 12/6/10 by cosmicpixie]

Very mis-leading thread title and why I clicked immediately because it sound like BP is threatening people. Instead it's about BP dispersant....shakes** BP better not threaten anything instead just shut-up spend more money, and plug damn hole like Odrama said.

Here is another article that talks about the dangers of the dispersents in the food chain and what it does to the chemical makeup of the oceans:

articles.mercola.com...

Very frightening. Apparently they have 800,000 more gallons of the dispersent on order.

[edit on 12-6-2010 by snowspirit]

I have lived in this area most of my life.

We honestly can see the future of this area without expert information, but it is still valid to consider.


I suppose we are hoping against hope that something will happen to stop it, to shorten the recovery time, etc, etc, etc.

The ramblings of a mind unable to face the destruction of my home, unable to respond to the future threats while they form and dig in to our reality here.


We only have so much anyway, just like everyone else. And now it's not only going, but will not be returning for some of us. Those who live long enough to see any recovery will be those who do not remember the beautiful and majestic Gulf as it was.

We will be divided, like those who went to New Orleans any time before Katrina, and those who have only seen it after, but the timescale will be much, much greater.

It's difficult to know what to do, or to do anything at all. With jobs in crisis, the confidence we once possessed in having skills/talents that aren't Gulf-related, or farm-related, seem to be flimsy things to lay our entire futures on.

And it's not like we have other places just waiting for us to move to, or anyone there to welcome us, as most families revolve around the family's land, home, etc. Those of us who do move away do it for jobs only, most of the time. Most of our family and support system is still in the South.

Is this our extinction, at last? Does this seem good? Is the US really better off without Southerners?

my little noted contribution, that the Gulf should be sealed-off from the Carribbean & the GulfStream, by building a wide levee connecting all the islands that form the chain called the Florida Keys...
and to then construct another arc of land from somewhere in the Key land bridge to connect with Cuba. thus containing the Gulf Loop current from mingling with the GulfStream current

the only open water then would be the clockwise flow of water into the Yuccatan area & into the Gulf--- with no exit past the Florida Straights,

the Gulf waters would circulate upon itself and keep only the Gulf itself as the Dead Zone of the next few generations


If we dont confine the soon to collapse or fissure trouble spot, then all the 400 degree oil will immediately blow into the Gulf water system and then kill off the whole Atlantic ocean water current


no one should have been permitted to deep drill in or on that plate fracture zone...
look at a plate techtonics graphic map & see this was a danger area to begin with


~~~ perhaps this is the early stage of the mass migration,
mass paradigm shift foretold by the Maya Katun calendar priests ? ~~~

[edit on 12-6-2010 by St Udio]

Does anyone think that there could be an agenda behind using the boom to guide the oil so it get's into the gulf stream alot quicker than it would it it just kept hemeraging out of the riser pipe so it will make it's way up the east coast faster

There were forcasts saying the ocean food chain would collapse
I mention the following as related because there may be a pattern
that this collapse is part of:

BP shut down the trans alaska too
which isn't talked about much here
because they had a spill and
they have not maintained the pipe well

this will drive related food prices through the roof
they are pretty much swat teaming the amish for selling raw milk
and if you are a farmer don't you dare sell direct in some localities

does any one else think this is a pattern?

Cliff high forcast the collapse of the food chain
he also did financial forecasting

In The Lindsey Williams reporting I have done, he has stated previously that the food would be on the shelves but too expensive to buy.
he has shown signs of being a limited- hang- outter
(shrimp farmed in India for example, or cheap chinee melominemilk)

remember when they shot all the buffalo from the train to starve the Sioux
whom they couldn't defeat?

Kissenger said that :
starvation is how they would control the people
(poor dumb animals)
18 months is the forcast for toxifyiong the food chain world wide

I'm thinking this is part of the plan




[edit on 12-6-2010 by Danbones]

I smoke cigarettes and because of Odrama I can no longer purchase from Indians..They are after every $$ now even from foreigners who page huge college tuition and don't steal jobs. This is bad you pay all these taxes for agency like mms and the F&&* the whole thing.

wether or not the dispersants being used as a solution to the problem, are worse than the oil in damage, it is the oil still, that is the bigger threat.

this leak has no quick fix and the cleanup of and destruction to, will go on for many years, if not decades.

it's already too late and no amount of money or solutions, will solve what will be faced through destruction of ecosystems and habitats, death of marine and wildlife animals, loss of income through business or commercial ventures or any other examples that will somehow be effected from this leak.

it already has become a worldwide problem, wether people see it or not. something that is here to stay for many years and something that will leave traces of its effects wherever it goes.