NEW ORLEANS (AP) -- Efforts to close a well spewing oil in the Gulf of
Mexico are failing so the Coast Guard is considering lighting the mess on
fire.
Crews have been unable to stop thousands of barrels of oil from fouling
gulf waters since an April 20 explosion sank the Deepwater Horizon, which
was drilling 50 miles off the Louisiana coast. Eleven workers are missing
and presumed dead, and the cause of the blast has not been determined.
Coast Guard Rear Adm. Mary Landry said the controlled burns would be done
during the day far from shore. Crews would make sure marine life and
people were protected and that work on other oil rigs would not be
interrupted.
The burning could start as early as Wednesday afternoon, but whether it
will work is unclear.
Ed Overton, a professor emeritus of environmental sciences at Louisiana
State University, questioned the method.
"It can be effective in calm water, not much wind, in a protected area,"
he said. "When you're out in the middle of the ocean, with wave actions
and currents pushing you around, it's not easy."
He has another concern: The oil samples from the spill he's looked at
shows it to be a sticky substance similar to roofing tar.
"I'm not super optimistic. This is tarry crude that lies down in the
water," he said. "But it's something that has got to be tried."
According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, birds
and mammals are more likely to escape a burning area of the ocean than
escape from an oil slick. The agency said birds might be disoriented by
the plumes of smoke, but they would be at much greater risk from exposure
to oil in the water.
A similar burn off the coast of Newfoundland in 1993 eliminated 50 to 99
percent of captured oil. However, burning the oil also creates air
pollution, and the effect on marine life is unclear.
Crews from the Texas General Land Office Oil Spill Prevention and
Response Program are bringing in equipment to help corral the oil and
burn the slick.
Texas Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson said burning surface oil is one
of the best ways to deal with so large a slick.
The last time crews with the agency used fire booms to burn oil was a
1995 spill on the San Jacinto River, Patterson said.
"When you burn it, the plume from the fire is the biggest environmental
concern, but this far out to sea it will not be as big of a problem,"
Patterson said.
Oil from the Deepwater Horizon is not expected to reach the coast until
late in the week, if at all. But longer-term forecasts show the winds and
ocean currents veering toward the coast. The glistening sheen of sweet
crude is forming long reddish-orange ribbons of oil that, if they wash up
on shore, could cover birds, white sand beaches and marsh grasses.
"As the days progress, the (oil) plume will migrate north, northeast,"
said Gregory W. Stone, an oceanographer and head of the Coastal Studies
Institute at Louisiana State University. "That plume will push onshore."
Hotel owners, fishermen and restaurateurs are keeping anxious watch.
Louis Skrmetta, 54, runs a company called Ship Island Excursions that
takes tourists to the Gulf Islands National Seashore, where white-sand
beaches and green water create an idyllic landscape.
"This is the worst possible thing that could happen to the Mississippi
Gulf Coast," he said. "It will wipe out the oyster industry. Shrimping
wouldn't recover for years. It would kill family tourism. That's our
livelihood."
The last major spill in the Gulf was in June 1979, when an offshore
drilling rig in Mexican waters - the Ixtoc I - blew up, releasing 140
million gallons. It took until March 1980 to cap the well, and the oil
contaminated U.S. waters and Texas shores.
As of Tuesday, the spill was about 20 miles offshore, south of Venice,
La. It covered an expanding area about 48 miles long and 80 miles wide,
but with uneven borders, making it difficult to calculate its area in
square miles.
"I understand there's got to be industry, but it's so sad for our kids.
We don't have a lot of beaches left," Bonnie Bethel, 66, said as she
watched her grandchildren splash in the water on a Mississippi beach.
"Can you imagine these poor birds in oil?"
Thousands of birds such as egrets and brown pelicans are nesting on
barrier islands close to the rig's wreckage. If the oil gets to them,
rescuers would need to reach their remote islands, wash them down and
release them back into the wild.
Michael Ziccardi, director of the Oiled Wildlife Care Network affiliated
with the University of California at Davis, said he is standing by to
clean up Gulf Coast birds.
"Just about any petroleum can cause problems for birds because they lose
their waterproofing, and that's what keeps them dry and warm," Ziccardi
said. "It's a really difficult time, and we're close to the peak of
migration."
The spill also threatens billions of fish eggs and larvae coating the
Gulf's surface this time of year.
If the well cannot be closed, almost 100,000 barrels of oil, or 4.2
million gallons, could spill into the Gulf before crews can drill a
relief well to alleviate the pressure. By comparison, the Exxon Valdez,
the worst oil spill in U.S. history, leaked 11 million gallons into
Alaska's Prince William Sound in 1989.
BP said Tuesday that it planned to begin drilling a relief well to
redirect the leaking oil in a $100 million effort to take the pressure
off the blown-out well.
The company said it would begin the drilling by Thursday even if crews
can shut off oil leaking from the pipe 5,000 feet underground. Robot subs
have tried to activate a shut-off device, but so far that has not worked.
Louisiana-based BP spokesman Neil Chapman said 49 vessels - oil skimmers,
tugboats barges and special recovery boats that separate oil from water -
are working to round up oil.
In Washington, meanwhile, the Obama administration launched a full
investigation of the explosion, promising every available resource.
---
Mohr reported from Biloxi, Miss. Associated Press writers Alan Sayre and
Kevin McGill in New Orleans, Melissa Nelson in Pensacola, Fla., and Ramit
Plushnick-Masti in Houston contributed to this report.
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