ROTTERDAM - The Dutch contribution in fighting the oil-spill in the Gulf of Mexico is being utilized insufficiently. Communications with the Americans is sluggish en they hardly listen to the Dutch experts.
A spokesperson of the Dutch company Mariflex has confirmed this on tuesday in an interview with a dutch radio station. At this moment, seven Dutch experts are in the United States to give advice on how to efficiently make use of the 6 special sweeper arms which were given to the American coastguard by the Dutch government. Each arm can sweep up 240 tons of oil each hour. But the American authorities disregard our advice completely, says the Mariflex spokesperson. One of the advices we have given them is to sweep up the oil further away from the source, since the oil is thicker there and easier to sweep up.
a. Ya can lead a horse to water, but ya can't make it drink.
b. If it all got cleaned up real quick, real efficiently--there would be no crisis. Never waste a good crisis and never let one end any earlier than neccessary. We need lots of fouled Florida beaches and lots more dead birds and fish in order to get new environmental and energy legislation passed thru congress.
ROTTERDAM - The Dutch contribution in fighting the oil-spill in the Gulf of Mexico is being utilized insufficiently. Communications with the Americans is sluggish en they hardly listen to the Dutch experts.
A spokesperson of the Dutch company Mariflex has confirmed this on tuesday in an interview with a dutch radio station. At this moment, seven Dutch experts are in the United States to give advice on how to efficiently make use of the 6 special sweeper arms which were given to the American coastguard by the Dutch government. Each arm can sweep up 240 tons of oil each hour. But the American authorities disregard our advice completely, says the Mariflex spokesperson. One of the advices we have given them is to sweep up the oil further away from the source, since the oil is thicker there and easier to sweep up.
[/QUOTE]
Um, we don't need the Dutch, we have actual movie stars that are helping. [/sarcasm]
It's upsetting to me as well Cliff. The United States Government no longer represents us. I'd apologize, but it would not change anything.
Brad
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10:14 AM
avengador1 Member
Posts: 35467 From: Orlando, Florida Registered: Oct 2001
The Exxon Valdez spill is officially tiny compared to the gulf. BP is still fighting the fines and has not paid those who lost their livelyhood to the spill. Pick up rocks on the beaches and oil is still visible in the sand. It is already too late for the marshes, decades have gone by from the smaller spill in a less fragile area and the damage is continuing to this day. The chinese answer to executives that cause this much damage and embarassment to the country is a penchant to shoot them in the back of the head as a deterrent to other execs.
Oh, as an aside, even though I am Alaskan I find representative Don Young dispicable for his comments and did not vote for him.
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04:08 PM
Toddster Member
Posts: 20871 From: Roswell, Georgia Registered: May 2001
I just helped my girl friend move here from Louisiana and the scene is one of utter devastation. The fishing industry is all but wiped out and the economy is going to go from bad to worse in no time. The bottom line is that Biden was right, Obama got his test, and he failed it.
YES, BP, Halliburton, and all the other companies that caused this disaster are to blame but frankly, I could care less about finger pointing right now. All I want is LEADERSHIP! Photo ops with snow cones and smiling faces are NOT what I want to see the President doing. I want to see him over tables of maps with big radios in the background with lots of flashing lights and men running in the background. WHY? Because even if the reality of the challenge we face is dire, I want the illusion that my president actually GETS IT! His country is under attack from a man-made disaster and it is action time!
America is known as a nation that can respond to a crisis and mobilze resources. That image is seriously hurting right now because of the "well what do you want from me" attitude of our "leader".
Cliff, I want all the damneed help we can get! And if I didn't live 2400 miles away, I would heading to the beach to wash birds. This American is grateful for any help we can get.
He was just waiting to find the right a$$ to kick, now they'll "be on it 24/7" until things "bounce back" Rah rah rah Can't wait for his speech tonight. So full of sh*t it's unreal. I am astounded by how easily led some people are. Prior presidents were Bullsh*tters too, but this guy takes the cake (and sqats on it and takes a dump) and his followers rub it all over themselves.
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The United States is accepting help from 12 countries and international organizations in dealing with the massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.
The State Department said in a statement Tuesday that the U.S. is working out the particulars of the help that's been accepted.
The identities of all 12 countries and international organizations were not immediately announced. One country was cited in the State Department statement -- Japan, which is providing two high-speed skimmers and fire containment boom.
More than 30 countries and international organizations have offered to help with the spill. The State Department hasn't indicated why some offers have been accepted and others have not.
That's the whole article, kinda sparse.
[This message has been edited by spark1 (edited 06-30-2010).]
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01:23 AM
fierobear Member
Posts: 27083 From: Safe in the Carolinas Registered: Aug 2000
Originally posted by Toddster: America is known as a nation that can respond to a crisis and mobilze resources. That image is seriously hurting right now because of the "well what do you want from me" attitude of our "leader".
This country is getting a hard lesson in what happens when you vote for a guy because he makes good speeches, or goes around talking about "hope" and "change", but doesn't have crap on his resume. Although 40-something percent of us DIDN'T vote for him, we're all going to suffer.
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01:37 AM
USFiero Member
Posts: 4875 From: Everywhere and Middle of Nowhere Registered: Mar 2002
Originally posted by fierobear: People no longer want a president, they want a messiah.
Man, you got that right. Americans have gotten damn lazy, fat and stupid.
Like frontal lobe pointed out, it's a no win for the big O. Let's declare war on it since it is outside our country's boarder, nuke it, and put up a 'mission accomplished' banner - then call it a day.
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08:06 AM
Jul 2nd, 2010
kevin Member
Posts: 2722 From: Elk Grove, CA USA Registered: Jan 2000
I am not sharig anything new to you, but as an American, I can share with you how to understand and decipher a liberal . The reason it has taken so long to clean up the oil in the Gulf of Mexico, is because, as a hard fast socialist, Obama believes that if he can hold out long enough cleaning this oil up, he will have invaluable amunition for passing his next stage of re-shapig America, the carbon tax initiative. Obama wants to massivley increase the tax on all of Americas people and the manufacturing companies, to the extent, that they would go BK. The end justify's the means. Obama believes in global warming. Together with our liberal thinking press corp, who runs his cover, he has the perfect recipe for dismantling our infrastructure. Obama sees acres and acres of windmills and solar panels on anything that can absorb the sun to run our economy. The problem is, Obama does not understand how little this source of power actually generates. If Obma undersood what a BTU is, maybe, again maybe, he would forget hid idioitc ideology. What he should do is listen to the students at MIT, Oxford, MTI (in India) and other notable scientific universities, they would tell him that his 'vision' is unrealistic. It is impossible to tax yoursself into prosperity. Social liberals are so easy understand. In Americas case, this is more difficult to overcome becasue all the liberals is the newspaper, all get a tingle up their leg everytime he talks. To thinking people, he is all full of pabulum, but to them, it des not matter, he is their messiah. This is their one and final shot for socialism, they will NOT pass it up. Hope this helps.
Cordialy, Kevin
[This message has been edited by kevin (edited 07-02-2010).]
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03:20 PM
pokeyfiero Member
Posts: 16189 From: Free America! Registered: Dec 2003
We had (maybe they are still) fleets of oil clean up ships and barges sitting at dock because the coast Guard said they had not had their fire extinguishers checked yet! WOW! The Gov of LA was screaming to get them out but he has no power.
I just heard we have another huge(the biggest) ship made just for this spill just sitting waiting for permission to start picking up oil!
I have numerous times about volunteers being turned away also.
To say that we have our head up our collective asses would be taken as a joke when in fact it is quite accurate.
America can not do anything anymore. We have become a country of managers that can't manage and has no one left to manage anyway.
If people are angry with me for saying such disparaging things about Our beloved country I understand you pride but really think if we had any pride as a nation would we have these problems in the first place. I feel sick and I feel embarrassed in front of the rest of the world.
BP does not want to do what is necessary to stop the leak. They are more interested in saving their prescious oil well than collapsing it... so you have to ask, since they are drilling relief wells that will be finished in august, how interested in stopping the oil leak effectively and quickly has BP ever been? Never, not for one second if the oil well can make them money after the leak stops.. so instead of doing the right thing and collapsing the well, they decided to lessen the leak, and hold out until august.
US governemnet should seize BP's assetts in our country right now, liquidate, and use it to clean up their mess. ..before they go bankrupt from their stock plummeting and have no $$$ left to pay back anything. BP is at fault, BP does not want to fix it immediately, BP is causing unheard of environmental damage (Now worst oil spill of all time) and they could not do the right thing.. all because there is more money to be had in that well.
By the way, how much money will bring back extinct Tuna populations? Oh, none.. because you can't buy a species from the brink of destruction. BP sickens me.
We had (maybe they are still) fleets of oil clean up ships and barges sitting at dock because the coast Guard said they had not had their fire extinguishers checked yet! WOW! The Gov of LA was screaming to get them out but he has no power.
I just heard we have another huge(the biggest) ship made just for this spill just sitting waiting for permission to start picking up oil!
I have numerous times about volunteers being turned away also.
To say that we have our head up our collective asses would be taken as a joke when in fact it is quite accurate.
America can not do anything anymore. We have become a country of managers that can't manage and has no one left to manage anyway.
If people are angry with me for saying such disparaging things about Our beloved country I understand you pride but really think if we had any pride as a nation would we have these problems in the first place. I feel sick and I feel embarrassed in front of the rest of the world.
Pokey.. as a former Navy swabbie, I have to point this out: There is nowhere to go when your ship is on fire... you have to be able to fight it. I know there is an emergency crisis going on, but abandoning safety completely to rush out there could cost more lives, and cause law suits. No way are these boats sailing without proper firefighting gear, for more than one reason.
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05:07 PM
Raydar Member
Posts: 40747 From: Carrollton GA. Out in the... country. Registered: Oct 1999
BP does not want to do what is necessary to stop the leak. They are more interested in saving their prescious oil well than collapsing it... so you have to ask, since they are drilling relief wells that will be finished in august, how interested in stopping the oil leak effectively and quickly has BP ever been? Never, not for one second if the oil well can make them money after the leak stops.. so instead of doing the right thing and collapsing the well, they decided to lessen the leak, and hold out until august. ...
Collapsing the well? How would you propose that they do that? (I can hardly wait...)
Maryjane has already weighed in on this, from the viewpoint of someone who has worked in the industry. Although I know nothing about the industry, everything he has said makes logical sense. I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. (How much industry experience do you have?) Basically, I'm pretty satisfied that BP is doing everything they can safely do to stop the leak. To do anything more drastic to the leaking wellhead is possibly risking a much larger leak.
As much as Obama hates to admit it, the oil industry is the one entity most capable of stopping this leak What he needs to be doing is rallying the troops to help clean up the mess. All he's done is bat his gums about "kicking somebody's ass". He needs to be part of the solution instead of being part of the damned problem. Even providing one of his "Executive Mandates" to eliminate the bureaucratic red tape would be useful.
But that wouldn't be politically expedient, would it!
Collapsing the well? How would you propose that they do that? (I can hardly wait...)
Maryjane has already weighed in on this, from the viewpoint of someone who has worked in the industry. Although I know nothing about the industry, everything he has said makes logical sense. I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. (How much industry experience do you have?) Basically, I'm pretty satisfied that BP is doing everything they can safely do to stop the leak. To do anything more drastic to the leaking wellhead is possibly risking a much larger leak.
As much as Obama hates to admit it, the oil industry is the one entity most capable of stopping this leak What he needs to be doing is rallying the troops to help clean up the mess. All he's done is bat his gums about "kicking somebody's ass". He needs to be part of the solution instead of being part of the damned problem. Even providing one of his "Executive Mandates" to eliminate the bureaucratic red tape would be useful.
But that wouldn't be politically expedient, would it!
I have as much "industry experience" as you have, maybe slightly more since I learned how to and fought numerous fires, including gasoline diesel fires, on my ship out in the water when I was in the Navy. But apparently I am not allowed to speak a suggestion or have an opinion about it without someone getting snooty .. if thats not the case, then my apologies in advance, but it sure sounds that way.
I never saw Mary Jane's post on the subject, so without a link I have no idea what you are talking about. Now: Plastic explosives with det cord could not be used? What about nukes? From what I understand, the shelf is already fairly unstable, it might not take that much effort.I never claimed to be an engineer, but I was reading this last night: http://www.americablog.com/...il-well-in-gulf.html
So now you know where my idea came from, several people seem to think it is possible, so I will parrot that sentiment. No, I have no industry experience, but I don't see BP acting nearly fast enough to stop the leak, and I bet they could if they didnt want to lose the money to be had from it in the future.
[This message has been edited by tbone42 (edited 07-02-2010).]
Pokey.. as a former Navy swabbie, I have to point this out: There is nowhere to go when your ship is on fire... you have to be able to fight it. I know there is an emergency crisis going on, but abandoning safety completely to rush out there could cost more lives, and cause law suits. No way are these boats sailing without proper firefighting gear, for more than one reason.
As a former Corpsman that spent a Med Cruise on the USS Nassau, I never saw DC (damage control) guys training with fire extinguishers, they did have miles of layflat hose though. This was just a case of some career CG inspector covering his hind parts.
quote
Originally posted by tbone42:
No, I have no industry experience, but I don't see BP acting nearly fast enough to stop the leak, and I bet they could if they didnt want to lose the money to be had from it in the future.
The money BP could make from this well is a drop in the bucket compared to the money it stands to loose after all the dust settles from this. I do have industry experience and I'm TELLING you, this well could never produce. The casing is washed out, the BOP is busted, and there is no way to produce this well in a controlled manner. Even if they did produce it consider this: At the estimated 35k barrels a day gushing times 75 bucks a barrel it would take over 20 YEARS just to make back the 20 billion they have promised. Obama called that 20B a DOWN PAYMENT.
EDIT
quote
Originally posted by tbone42: Now: Plastic explosives with det cord could not be used? What about nukes? From what I understand, the shelf is already fairly unstable, it might not take that much effort.I never claimed to be an engineer, but I was reading this last night: http://www.americablog.com/...il-well-in-gulf.html
While this method may have worked for the Soviets, the circumstances in the Gulf of Mexico are much different. As LiveScience's Jeremy Hsu points out: "The Russians were using nukes to extinguish gas well fires in natural gas fields, not sealing oil wells gushing liquid, so there are big differences, and this method has never been tested in such conditions."
Extinguishers were in every p-way of my ship (D-commed now) , and hoses too. Large fires, no not fightable with extinguishers, but I saw the microwave blow up in the galley once and glad we had an extinguisher nearby. Anyway, my point was lawsuits.. no way those are leaving the docks without even minor safety measures in place.
My best friend on ship did your job... never showed mercy with innoculations and the like. Sadist. Anyway, we did a SouthPAC and a Great Lakes cruise (also known as premium duty..) that tour was gravy. And so were the girls.
[This message has been edited by tbone42 (edited 07-02-2010).]
Well, you might be a sadist as well, but I was talking about my friend the corpsman.
Regardless, maybe I am a jaded idealist, but I expect the worst from the oil spill and I got it. We should have been accepting help from the international community the minute they offered.. this is not the King of Siam offering war elephants to Lincoln... but we were willing to and went it alone, basically, in war too. If your brain is at all like mine, it is hard to fathom why help is not accepted or wanted in situations like this.
[This message has been edited by tbone42 (edited 07-02-2010).]
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06:06 PM
Raydar Member
Posts: 40747 From: Carrollton GA. Out in the... country. Registered: Oct 1999
Originally posted by tbone42: I have as much "industry experience" as you have, maybe slightly more ...
I never said that I had any industry experience at all. Just that there is at least one retired roughneck here (but in reality, several more) who seems to know what he's talking about regarding wells and their geology. I looked for the thread with maryjane's (Don's) post, but couldn't find it. But basically, what I heard / read leads me to believe that a nuclear explosion might fracture the ocean floor and cause all that oil to blow out all at once. The reason that it's under such pressure now is because of the weight of the the ocean and the sea floor weighing down on all that fluid. Suppose the explosion just fractures all the substrate instead of fusing it.
It might work. But if it goes bad, it could make things much worse. It'll likely be sealed in a few weeks anyway.
[This message has been edited by Raydar (edited 07-02-2010).]
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07:04 PM
Raydar Member
Posts: 40747 From: Carrollton GA. Out in the... country. Registered: Oct 1999
...We should have been accepting help from the international community the minute they offered.. this is not the King of Siam offering war elephants to Lincoln... but we were willing to and went it alone, basically, in war too. If your brain is at all like mine, it is hard to fathom why help is not accepted or wanted in situations like this.
I never said that I had any industry experience at all. Just that there is at least one retired roughneck here (but in reality, several more) who seems to know what he's talking about regarding wells and their geology. I looked for the thread with maryjane's (Don's) post, but couldn't find it. But basically, what I heard / read leads me to believe that a nuclear explosion might fracture the ocean floor and cause all that oil to blow out all at once. The reason that it's under such pressure now is because of the weight of the the ocean and the sea floor weighing down on all that fluid. Suppose the explosion just fractures all the substrate instead of fusing it.
It might work. But if it goes bad, it could make things much worse. It'll likely be sealed in a few weeks anyway.
Yes, I thought the explosion would fuse it... once again, not and engineer or a scientist, but at this point the ecological and economic damage to the coast is getting frightening, IMO it may never recover. And it just seems to me they are not making enough effort, BP that is, every week its "Hey lets try this next" and why isn't there a plan in place when they are installed? You would think anything that can blow up and leak would have tons of safeties, including shutoff valves way down there and redundancies?
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07:34 PM
Raydar Member
Posts: 40747 From: Carrollton GA. Out in the... country. Registered: Oct 1999
Yes, I thought the explosion would fuse it... once again, not and engineer or a scientist, but at this point the ecological and economic damage to the coast is getting frightening, IMO it may never recover. And it just seems to me they are not making enough effort, BP that is, every week its "Hey lets try this next" and why isn't there a plan in place when they are installed? You would think anything that can blow up and leak would have tons of safeties, including shutoff valves way down there and redundancies?
The well may have been missing a lot of safeguards. Simply because they thought "Aww... nothing will happen." You can bet that the next one will have them, though. If there is a next one.
As for the slow progress, remember that nobody has ever done this before. Ever. Not at 5000 feet under water. They're having to think on their feet, and invent stuff as they go. I certainly wouldn't want to be responsible.
