First Hand account: Florida Beaches Are Polluted With Oil (I was wrong)

reply to post by getreadyalready


OP, though it's already been stated, thanks for taking the time to record these videos and post them. Their quality is great.

Why is this beach still open? There's plenty of visible evidence to warrant closing it. It's also scary that you say people were fishing not far from your location. I'm shocked that they can't tell something's wrong with the water and they just continue fishing in it!

Well, it takes courage to admit being wrong, props for that.

Many people believed the 75% gone claim, however it is more like 75% of the surface oil has been dispersed into the water.

The real problem from this will probably be the amount of nutrition microorganisms got from this incident. We all have heard the concern about fertilizers affecting plankton and algae growth in the ocean. The oil is a great source of food for bacteria and microorganisms. This could possible change the whole ecosystem balance in the area for a very long time, and even change weather patterns (there is a thread about the connection between water color and hurricane formations at ats)

reply to post by Wookiep


It wasn't a curve ball. Looked like a strike to me.

A mere two months ago Samantha claimed this spill was going to be an apocalypse like no other in mankind. Two months later the government said no it wasn't. They also said they still needed to monitor the situation. She took their results and basically said....nah...I don't believe it. She didn't do her own test after they said that.

What was she going to do? Look like a fool in front of her colleagues? Or is it more likely she would try to debunk the government? How would it look if she used all that grant money to do research only to have her efforts debunked by the government?

Look, my point is simple. The OP claims the beach is contaminated with oil. He offers nothing but videos without any chemical analysis that it is in fact contaminated. Anyone who reads this thread would think the beach is contaminated. It's irresponsible to do that in my opinion.

Now if the beach is contaminated then he needs to go to the mayor and have it closed down. He needs to call his state elected officials and demand they do more testing. But to spread fear based on hyper sensitivity to beaches now is just plain wrong. Everything he pointed out has been there for years. He just never noticed it before.

Get a sample of water, get it to a laboratory, maybe they can show the %of oil and or or substances affecting the water.

If you could specify which Florida beaches are smeared that would be fantabulous.

There is something on the order of over 1200 miles of beaches in Florida. To say "Florida" beaches" are tarred is dishonest at best. For example the beaches in Clearwater are perfect. This is essentially next in line from the panhandle, while the other side of the state accounts for about half of Florida's beaches.

[edit on 18-8-2010 by IgnoranceIsntBlisss]

reply to post by ProtoplasmicTraveler


If you could provide one single article that mentions oil washing up in Miami that would be stellar.

The human brain is open to suggestion and its easy to assume oil would be there, and then perceive it. Perception isn't always reality.

The beaches in Clearwater are perfect.

The Gulf is HUGE, and the global ocean network makes that gusher look like a nanoparticle.

Originally posted by justadood
sigh and lol. 75% represents 3/4rs. feel free to 'do the math'

If you have some info, present it.

40% of the gushing was methane.
75% of the remaining 60% will be totally evaporated.
20% of that remaining 60% was wax.
3% of that remaining 60% was actual tar & asphalt.

Tar / Asphalt isn't really all that toxic. We all walk and drive on it every single day.

[edit on 18-8-2010 by IgnoranceIsntBlisss]

I have to admit OP, I always thought eventually you would come around and admit you were wrong. I am pretty sure you and I have went a round or two in other threads, I am not to sure, but I know for a fact you were one of the posters who drove me nuts seeing some of your responses in other threads. I would literally want to bang my head on the keyboard.

I take no pleasure at all in watching you admit you were wrong. In fact, it makes me sad. Very sad. If someone who was such a stout defender in all those other threads has turned his opinion around like this, it just has to be blatantly obvious that even a blind man can see it.

I like to describe the Gulf of Mexico to others as a fish bowl. Now with reports from Texas to Florida, it only takes common sense to realize the fish bowl has filled up. The only questions in my mind that remains now is how bad will it get? How contaminated is the Gulf? and will that contamination spread out into the Atlantic?

We have allowed the Gulf to be destroyed. You can not introduce foreign agents into the water with no repercussions. It does not belong there, it is not natural. The wildlife will have to adapt or die. Time will be the only thing that will tell us how bad it will really be.

You said you did some swimming and felt some burning from scraps you have on your legs? Please keep us updated if you notice anything out of the ordinary. Sores, blisters, discoloration of the skin. I am sure a few of us would be very interested in knowing about it.

edit to add: The videos certainly do not look like the Florida Coast to me, it looks more like the shores in New Jersey.. but maybe just a bit cleaner.

[edit on 18-8-2010 by MrWendal]

Long beach has the same thing.


You have to be a real insensitive person to go around telling people who live there that stuff isn't oil.

Look at the size of the slick.


[edit on 18-8-2010 by oilwatchernx2]

Originally posted by Come Clean
Where is the control video? You know, the one that shows the beach before the oil spill. That beach looks just like all the other beaches around the Gulf Coast.

Gulf beaches have never looked like beaches from the Caribbean.

[edit on 18-8-2010 by Come Clean]

We have to wait for a working time machine (Gentile, whats going on man, hurry up with it!!)before we can compare these videos with a control video.

I guess until then we have only the word of a member here who even themselves has had a change of mind over this disaster, based on their own observation of the area they've frequented numerous times.

It's not that difficult to imagine however, given what we saw for months.

TO me, when the OP was stepping into the water, it looked exactly like the 'drains' that I used to muck about in as a kid, when I lived in an industrial area. I never swam in it, but it was a big ol' pool of water that was fun to play with remote control boats in, despite the stench of oil. It was disgusting a few inches into the water and that was on a
good day.


[edit on 18/8/2010 by badw0lf]

I didnt even know this topic was still up for debate anymore,

Doc Velocity debunked this as a hoax weeks ago and didnt even have to leave North Carolina.

He even started a thread proving that he had been vindicated, so it must be true.

Hey, Getreadyalready.

Thanks so much for your excellent post, it's the kind of post which lifts ATS up to the level many of us love to see.

I am so sorry to hear how bad it is. You may remember I copped some criticism the other day, lol! ...and that's absolutely no problem. Af the time I appreciated your obviously very sincere wish to paint a true picture, and that was what you were doing based on the experience you had had so far.

I'm really, really sorry that it now appears the pollution is obviously much worse than you imagined. That really sucks and I so feel for you and everyone down there.

What the Cess-Pit is doing to our planet and our people is horrific.

Dems, Reps, no matter, it's all a front to cover their united action to destroy everything and create hell on earth. They've gotta go!

Take care you guys, and if you can, keep us updated.

What's a hoax? The oil in the water or no oil in the water?

That was a week ago...

yeah, that certainly isnt the gulf coast i remember.

my question is: since CORExIT was certainly an ecological fail, meant to hide the oil vs eliminate it, will oil eating MICROBES be able to survive and do their job, if used now?

contrary to popular belief, i dougt highly that the oil went away, especially from your vids.

sad....that isnt the gulf coast i remember....wonder how pensacola's doin...

It seems that there is another PB well that is faulty and that have not been sealed yet I don't know if it's true or not but I think everyone should know and if so, a new thread should start about that
Here's the link

BP Site B

This, along with what is being said on the news about the oil on the seafloor effecting the food chain, has me scared again.

Thank you so very much, though, for making this documentary for us.
Much appreciated.

Echoing the sentiments of the posters before me - I appreciate that you went and did this!! Here in Australia there is basically no opportunity to see first hand what is going on over there. It's good to finally see some real images and read real first-hand experiences from a real person "on deck", not the rubbish that they let us see on the nightly news.

Hopefully others are inspired to do the same in similar affected areas.

I admire your trust of the officials saying it was okay to swim and I applaud your findings then sharing them with us!

Having not read through all four pages of this thread, I'm not sure if you answered this or not but, what or why do you attribute the beach being oil drenched this week but yet, okay 2 weeks ago? What do you suppose happened in the last two weeks?

I live on the other side (Palm Beach county) and not sure if this is related but only yesterday I saw a lot of orange booms out in the Intracoastal. I've never seen them before but that may be because I wasn't alert to them in the past as I am now, after this oil leak.

Man......I wonder if Earth will ever fully recover from this mess. Obama seems to think so (can you all say "one-term president"?)

reply to post by IgnoranceIsntBlisss

There is something on the order of over 1200 miles of beaches in Florida. To say "Florida" beaches" are tarred is dishonest at best

"Dishonest", might not have been the best choice of words.
This is something we are going to have to adjust to. What's true of one beach today, might not be true elsewhere, and next week it might just
turnabout to a reversal.

It's going to depend on "how the winds blow" and how the currents and tides flow.


[edit on 8/18/2010 by ladyinwaiting]

that op is a sad state of affairs, looks like
your correct and the corexit has mixed in
with the oil to form an emulsion.

in my opinion it would of been better to
let the oil rise to the surface and skim it
off.

who knows how long it will take for the
toxins to degrade,if at all!

sad very sad.