Gulf Spill May Far Exceed Official Estimates

Gulf Spill May Far Exceed Official Estimates

... experts examined video that BP released Wednesday. Their findings suggest the BP spill is already far larger than the 1989 Exxon Valdez accident in Alaska, which spilled at least 250,000 barrels of oil.

BP has said repeatedly that there is no reliable way to measure the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico by looking at the oil gushing out of the pipe. But scientists say there are actually many proven techniques for doing just that.

Steven Wereley, an associate professor of mechanical engineering at Purdue University, analyzed videotape of the seafloor gusher using a technique called particle image velocimetry.

A computer program simply tracks particles and calculates how fast they are moving. Wereley put the BP video of the gusher into his computer. He made a few simple calculations and came up with an astonishing value for the rate of the oil spill: 70,000 barrels a day — much higher than the official estimate of 5,000 barrels a day.

"We're talking more than a factor-of-10 difference between what I calculate and the number that's being thrown around," Wereley said.

- Full Story

Other Calculations Support Wereley's Claim.

Timothy Crone, a scientist with the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, arrived at a minimum figure of 50,000 barrels a day. And Eugene Chiang, a professor of astrophysics at the University of California, Berkeley, estimated the spill at between 20,000 and 100,000 barrels a day.

John Amos, the president and founder of the nonprofit firm SkyTruth, estimates that the amount of oil leaking into the Gulf is more like 20,000 barrels a day -- four times the Coast Guard estimate, and 20 times what BP originally claimed.

Ian R. MacDonald, an oceanographer at Florida State University who is an expert in the analysis of oil slicks, said he had made his own rough calculations using satellite imagery that suggests the leak could “easily be four or five times” the government estimate.


"I'm surprised with the number of people working on this problem that one guy working on his own in an afternoon is able to come up with a number the BP engineers couldn't."
- Steven Wereley.

Of course BP refutes these claims and says that "there's no way to estimate the flow coming out of the pipe accurately." This is begining to look like a bigger problem than we might want to think and the fact that BP is begining to come off as completely incompetent is scarey enough. If these independent estimates are correct, we could be looking at the largest human-caused environmental disaster in history.

[edit on 15-5-2010 by Hullabaloo]

The government has been lying since this incident happened. So has BP. Corporate America in bed with the US government.........meanwhile the people suffer. What's new? Obama's get tough on oil companies empty rhetoric BS is nauseating and disgusting. This will be one of the most catastrophic economic and environmental disasters the world has ever faced. And I say the world because this will definitely impact other areas of the ocean not just the gulf.

BP has been responsible for 3 of the worst oil disasters in US history in the last 5 years! 5 YEARS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! They lobbied congress in order to not have to install safety valve measures that other countries require. I'm almost ashamed to call myself an American anymore. Our government has sold their soul to the highest bidder........the Republic is broken.

[edit on 15-5-2010 by Zosynspiracy]

[edit on 15-5-2010 by Zosynspiracy]

Geez, i'm still trying to not fall in the usual running and screaming, but the rate at which estimations are growing in volume everyday, i'm starting to think we are all (earthlings) going to suffer this corporate-funded "accident"...
May buddha and the Aliens and Peter Pan help us, or we are so screwed...

Originally posted by drakus
Geez, i'm still trying to not fall in the usual running and screaming, but the rate at which estimations are growing in volume everyday, i'm starting to think we are all (earthlings) going to suffer this corporate-funded "accident"...
May buddha and the Aliens and Peter Pan help us, or we are so screwed...

They're not coming

[edit on 16-5-2010 by Hullabaloo]