Titans of Industry category archive

On the Media looks at coverage of the wild well and claims that BP was trying to throttle reporting. From the website:

A handful of media outlets have reported that their reporters were denied access while trying to cover the oil spill in the Gulf, leaving some journalists worried that BP is deciding where they can and can’t go. Times-Picayune photojournalist Ted Jackson recounts his access problems while Lieutenant Commander Chris O’Neil of the US Coast Guard explains that BP is definitely not calling the shots.

A nugget from the transcript:

BOB GARFIELD (from On the Media–ed.): Just the suggestion that BP is making decisions about the movements of journalists caused an outcry, and by midweek the Coast Guard had stepped in to clarify its media policy and to reiterate that BP is definitely not making the rules.

But by that point, a few journalists had already been running in circles, including Times-Picayune photojournalist Ted Jackson, trying to do a routine flyover. Jackson had hired a seaplane to get aerial shots of the spill.

TED JACKSON (news photographer–ed.): Typically, you call the FAA and request permission to get below the temporary flight restriction, and the flight restriction that day was 3,000 feet, which is way too high to make a picture. So we requested to be able to fly lower than that, and the authority asked who was on the flight. And he said, I have the Times-Picayune photographer. And the answer was immediately, no then, you cannot have this exemption.

The seaplane company owner asked him, can I get your name so I can put your name in the file of people who were denying this request? He told him his name, and he said that he was a BP contractor hired to handle aviation requests. And that was just very disturbing to think that I was being denied access from a BP representative.

Follow the link to listen or read the transcript or listen here:

Brendan is getting Buccaneer Petroleum’s press releases, sub rosa, as ’twere.

You can’t make this stuff up. But BP can.

Bookmark Brendan Calling, sign up for the RSS feed, have a drink or four (I recomment four or more), and enjoy the science fiction.

It makes the Cthullu Mythos seem prosaic.

The Guardian editorializes. A nugget (emphasis added):

Ever since the formerly government-owned corporation went entirely private in 1987, and especially under the 12-year reign of John Browne from the mid-90s, BP has adopted a business manner that could politely be described as gung ho. Its American rival Exxon is fierce about keeping to high technical standards, Shell prides itself on its solid engineering – but BP has long been about outsourcing vital operations (the Deepwater Horizon rig that exploded was owned and operated by another firm), doing big deals (taking over Amoco, for instance) and trading. It is, in short, an oil company that acts like a particularly brash bank.

The results have often been horrific. Not just Deepwater, but the explosion of the Texas City refinery in 2005 and the fractures in its Alaskan pipelines in 2006-07. This particular crisis is also comparable with the sub-prime meltdown, in that the laxity of American regulation led to disaster.

Karoli at C&L discusses nuking BP’s wild well.

The idea gives me the willies from the git-go. I’m not a physicist, though I know a little bit about physics and a lot about history. Blowing stuff up is seldom an effective choice, though it appeals to the macho and the frustrated and especially the frustrated macho. Blowing it up is their alternative to getting it u–never mind.

A nugget from Karoli’s post:

As I understand it, the goal with any explosive device is to cause the hole to collapse on itself. According to some experts, the problem with conventional explosives is the same problem other solutions are bumping against: this well is so deep and subject to such severe pressure that there’s no empirical evidence available to support or refute the claim conventional explosives would succeed. If they didn’t succeed, the problem might be made even worse.

This is an incredibly frustrating problem, not only because of the draconian measures needed to stop the spillage, but because we’re being asked to take so much on faith when it comes to the steps needed to stop the leak and clear the oil.

• We’re told dispersants are non-toxic but hazmat suits are needed and the manufacturer’s own instructions recommend they not come in contact with bare skin.
• We haven’t been told what kind of impact dropping all that mud has, particularly when mixed with oil.
• We have no idea how long it will take the microbial agents to eat the oil and clear the water.
  We have absolutely no clue as to whether a nuclear device will work and if it does, whether it will do so at the expense of all living things for years to come.
• Worst of all, no one has any faith in the information we’re receiving from BP, because they have not been forthright with us and appear to be acting in their best interests rather than our own.

I wasn’t a rocket scientist in school, but common sense tells me the nuclear option may not be the best one.

Via Bob Cesca.

Addendum, a cup of coffee later:

Leonard Pitts.

A team of top federal prosecutors and investigators has taken the first steps toward a formal criminal investigation into oil giant BP’s actions before and after the drilling rig disaster off Louisiana. The investigators, who have been quietly gathering evidence in Louisiana over the last three weeks, are focusing on whether BP skirted federal safety regulations and misled the U.S. government by saying it could quickly clean up an environmental accident. The team has met with U.S. attorneys and state officials in the Gulf Coast region and has sent letters to executives of BP and Transocean Ltd., the drilling rig owner, warning them against destroying documents or other internal records.

I hope they have computer and physical forensics folks on call, because I find it extremely unlikely that DEL keys ain’t clickin’ and shredders ain’t shreddin’.

Via Intoxination.

McClatchy:

In his memo to Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen, Michaels (assistant secretary of labor for occupational safety and health–ed.) said his agency has witnessed numerous problems at several work sites and staging areas through the Gulf Coast region.

“The organizational systems that BP currently has in place, particularly those related to worker safety and health training, protective equipment, and site monitoring, are not adequate for the current situation or the projected increase in clean-up operations,” Michaels said in the memo.

“I want to stress that these are not isolated problems,” he continued. “They appear to be indicative of a general systemic failure on BP’s part, to ensure the safety and health of those responding to this disaster.”

Michaels added that BP “has also not been forthcoming with basic, but critical, safety and health information on injuries and exposures.”

Every railroad in the US has a set General Rules of Conduct. Early on in them, often the first one, begins with

Safety is of the first importance in the discharge of duty . . .

Andy Borowitz has more:

In a new video that is light on his usual threats but heavy on admiration, Osama bin Laden admits that he is “professionally envious” of oil giant BP’s massive oil spill, saying that it puts his efforts to create destruction and chaos to shame.

“There are times in an evildoer’s life when one has to stand back and admire a job well done,” Mr. bin Laden says in the video. “BP, you blow me away.”

Borowitz via John Cole.

Over at the Mudflats, Professor Rick Steiner has a cum mortem (can’t’ call it a post mortem cause the patient ain’t dead yet) of BP’s wild well.

Read it.

Via Bob Cesca.

BP PR OMG WTF.

Derrick Z. Jackson reacts to BP’s ass-covering PR campaign. A nugget:

The most intriguing paragraph of the BP ad was, “This is an enormous team effort. More than 2,500 of our operational and technical personnel from around the world are working tirelessly in coordination with the U.S. Coast Guard, and federal, state and local government agencies.’’

But until Deepwater Horizon exploded, BP’s idea of working tirelessly with government agencies was lobbying them to bypass environmental-impact reviews for well permits.

Fake Twitter accounts satirize BP.

The wild well, on its way to our part of the world:

Via Bob Cesca.

Addendum:

The embed was working; I tested it both at Bob Cesca’s Awesome Blog and here.

I suspect UStream’s servers got overloaded.

Look at it, if only for a moment. It is most depressing.

BP=Bumbling Phools.

Addendum-dee-dum-dum:

Video moved to Livestream. New embed linked.

A dream, mistily perceived as through the rainbow of an oil-coated window: Tony Hayward, water skis, no wetsuit, Gulf of Mexico.

Numbers. Thin air.

In its 2009 exploration plan for the Deepwater Horizon well, BP PLC states that the company could handle a spill involving as much as 12.6 million gallons of oil per day, a number 60 times higher than its current estimate of the ongoing Gulf disaster.

In associated documents filed with the U.S. Minerals Management Service, the company says that it would be able to skim 17.6 million gallons of oil a day from the Gulf in the event of a spill.

(Via Atrios).

Meanwhile, across the street:

The whistleblower is Kenneth Abbott, a former project control supervisor contracted by BP who also gave an interview to “60 Minutes” on Sunday night. In a conversation last week with ProPublica, Abbott alleged that BP failed to review thousands of final design documents for systems and equipment on the Atlantis platform — meaning BP management never confirmed the systems were built as they were intended – and didn’t properly file the documentation that functions as an instruction manual for rig workers to shut down operations in the case of a blowout or other emergency.

Abbott alleges that when he warned BP about the dangers presented by the missing documentation the company ignored his concerns and instead emphasized saving money.

And down the hall, it’s rounding the Keys and heading up the coast:

Click here for a larger image.

The Guardian has more.

Zandar is calling it “Lake Palin.” Wonder if that’s what I’ll be swimming in this summer.

I have been receiving Popular Mechanics for some reason or other. I sometimes find something interesting in it, but certainly not enough to renew the subscription that came to me from I know not where. I’m not planning to build my own submarine or jump off a mountain in a homemade flying suit any time soon.

This issue is different: I learned from it that the supply of anti-venom used to counteract bites from venomous snakes in the United States and throughout the world is drying up. The anti-venom is not much in demand because not all that many persons get snake bites; but it’s absolutely necessary for those who do.

Why the shortage? The drug companies consider the market just too small and aren’t interested in making the stuff.

Unlike other types of drugs, the ones we see advertised on cable television, the drug companies cannot mount ad campaigns to convince persons to ask their doctors for some anti-venom they way they try to convince persons to ask their doctors for sleeping pills.

Do you have trouble sleeping an night? You might have snake bite. Ask your doctor about Antivenomax, the diamondback pill!.

Remember,

Red on black,
friend of Jack.
Black on red,
Antivenomax–
the diamondback pill.

Nah. Won’t work.

So if a venomous snake bites you, you may just be on your own.

Here’s more from the U. K. Independent newspaper.

It looks as if BP accomplished their latest tactic for plugging the wild well.

BP succeeded Sunday in capturing some oil and gas by inserting a mile-long tube into the main Gulf of Mexico leak, but did not say what percentage of the gusher was being contained.

They’ve slowed, not stopped, the bleeding, and the patient is still in jeopardy. From the same story:

Fresh analysis of enormous plumes of oil just under the surface of the Gulf meanwhile suggested the spill was far worse than previously estimated.

Videos via Bob Cesca,

Remember back in grade school jamming soda straws together and then trying to suck up your Coke (that’s Coca-Cola, wise guys) through them?

That worked really well, now, didn’t it?

BP officials say they have decided to first try sucking oil away from the gushing Gulf well with a tube that will be inserted into the jagged pipe leaking on the seafloor.

Company spokesman Bill Salvin said BP hopes to start moving the 6-inch tube into the leaking 21-inch pipe — known as the riser — on Thursday night. The smaller tube will be surrounded by a stopper to keep oil from leaking into the sea.

Raw Story reports:

The retired chairman of an energy investment banking firm told National Geographic in little-noticed comments Thursday that efforts to stop the oil leak under the Gulf of Mexico could prove fruitless and than oil could gush into the ocean for years.

Matthew Simmons, retired chair of the energy-industry investment bank Simmons & Company, said that BP and the US military’s engineers are more or less clueless about cutting off the flow.

“We don’t have any idea how to stop this,” Simmons said. The former banker mocked a proposal to try and plug the leak with trash, saying it was a “joke.”

Listen to Neil King of the Wall Street Journal recite the failures on the Diane Rehm Show (starting about 10 minutes in): A summary of the high points of the litany:

• Halliburton–shoddy cement seal.
• Transocean–“blowout preventer” with leaks and a dead battery.
• BP–choosing to proceed when, four hours before the explosing, sensing equipment showed that something really freaky was going on down below.

I would not recommend listening to the entire hour of the Diane Rehm Show. It’s pretty depressing.

Shooting junk, the BP way (when I was a young ‘un, “shooting junk” connoted a different type of shot):

It occurs to me that it might be time to reread When the World Screamed.

Via BartBlog.