And in other news, a *New* Gusher in the Gulf. No shit. Another well is spewing in Baratraia Bay.

[Stinky The Clown]

Isn't this just special?

http://www.clevelandleader.com/node/14237

2nd Oil Spill in the Gulf of Mexico After Boat Crashes into Oil Well

The Gulf of Mexico and the coastline surrounding it has had its fair share of oil-leak related problems in recent months, and now it's about to get worse. During the early morning hours on Tuesday, a boat struck an oil well and now there is a second leak in the Gulf.

A barge collided with the well, shearing off its valve structure and releasing pressurized natural gas and light oil. The welli s located in Barataria Bay, which is south of New Orleans. According to the Jefferson Parish Homeland Security Director, Deano Bonano, the area has been evacuated and a US Coast Guard team is on its way to the accident site.

The USCG will be responsible for coordinating the response from command centers in Mobile, Alabama and New Orleans. Clean-up workers are currently using a boom to contain the spill, however, oil is still shooting up at least 20 feet in the air.

Bonano says that a contractor who handles the well is also on the way. Federal officials do not yet know who owns the well.

[Newest Reality]

1. Oh gosh ...

and there are thousands and thousands of wells in the Gulf and many of them are old and sit like ticking time bombs.

[Ozymanithrax]

2. The story I heard said it was an abandoned oil well...n/t

[maddezmom]

5. just read the same...was supposed to be lit/marked and was not

Barge hits well near Gulf, sends oil, gas spewing
By KEVIN McGILL (AP) – 9 hours ago

NEW ORLEANS — A barge slammed into an abandoned well in a coastal inlet early Tuesday, sending a shower of water, natural gas and oil spewing about 100 feet into the air.

Emergency officials said about 6,000 feet of containment boom was in place around the site in a lake just north of Barataria Bay, which has already been fouled by oil from the massive BP spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

~snip~

The towboat captain told investigators the well was not lit as required, Coast Guard Capt. John Arenstam said.

The Coast Guard hired Wild Well Control Inc. to begin attempts to cap the well later Tuesday. Another contractor is handling cleanup.

The Coast Guard identified the well owner as Houston-based Cedyco Corp., but authorities said they had been unable to contact the company. Calls to Cedyco by The Associated Press were not returned Tuesday.

more: http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5goAO1X4EEp6JwVmrPYUu5-o8oqdAD9H7KIVG0


how many more out there are not marked? :mad:

[Ozymanithrax]

7. 27,000 according to one story.

Abandoned oil wells make Gulf of Mexico 'environmental minefield'AP
Investigation finds BP was responsible for 600 of more than 27,000 abandoned wells in the Gulf of Mexico

The Gulf of Mexico is packed with abandoned oil wells from a host of companies including BP, according to an investigation by Associated Press, which describes the area as "an environmental minefield that has been ignored for decades".

While the explosion and subsequent sinking of the Deepwater Horizon rig has thrown the spotlight sharply on BP's activities in the Gulf of Mexico, environmental safety in the area has been neglected for decades.

There are more than 27,000 abandoned wells in the Gulf of Mexico, according to AP, of which 600 belonged to BP.

The oldest of these abandoned wells dates back to the late 1940s and the investigation highlights concerns about the way in which some of them have been plugged, especially the 3,500 neglected wells that are catalogued by the government as "temporarily abandoned". The rules for shutting off temporarily closed wells are not as strict as for completely abandoned wells.

[Occulus]

8. Properly decommissioning and safeguarding those 27,000 wells

could create a few jobs.

How many of them have been dealt with properly?

Jobs. Project. And it would make the Gulf SAFER.

x(

[Leopolds Ghost]

11. Can't afford it. We're in a recession, remember? Tax revenues down. Wall St's making no money!

:sarcasm:

[piratefish08]

12. unless we declare the Gulf a war zone - then BLAM - $33 billion available.......

did I just solve the Gulf problem?

[Ozymanithrax]

14. Most of those wells have not been sealed.

It is a big problems waiting to happen. But it probably requires expertise held by the oil companies to do it, though people coudl be trained to use the heavy equipment.

[w4rma]

3. Can we get some regulations on these things passed and enforced? (nt)

[flyarm]

4. they are like land mines awaiting someone to detonate them! eom

[Canuckistanian]

6. Nobody knows who owns the well? Seriously?

Some oil company spent millions drilling, installing equipment then capping a well - and they don't know who OWNS it?.

[gtar100]

9. Stall tactic until they can come up with a good cover story.

The propaganda and spin they put on stories these days is getting more and more transparent. They take us for fools and unfortunately in many cases they are right.

[Scurrilous]

10. From 11 hours ago:

<snip>

"A barge slammed into an abandoned well in a coastal inlet early Tuesday, sending a shower of water, natural gas and oil spewing about 100 feet into the air.

Emergency officials said about 6,000 feet of containment boom was in place around the site in a lake just north of Barataria Bay, which has already been fouled by oil from the massive BP spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

While there was no estimate of how much oil was spewing Tuesday, officials said the mile-long slick it created was small compared with the Gulf spill.

The Coast Guard said the towboat Pere Ana C was pushing the barge on Mud Lake when it hit the wellhead about 1 a.m. No one was hurt.

The towboat captain told investigators the well was not lit as required, Coast Guard Capt. John Arenstam said.

The Coast Guard hired Wild Well Control Inc. to begin attempts to cap the well later Tuesday. Another contractor is handling cleanup.

The Coast Guard identified the well owner as Houston-based Cedyco Corp., but authorities said they had been unable to contact the company. Calls to Cedyco by The Associated Press were not returned Tuesday."

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5goAO1X4EEp6JwVmrPYUu5-o8oqdAD9H7KIVG0

[spanone]

13. no problem...

On the Surface, Gulf Oil Spill Is Vanishing Fast; Concerns Stay

once you can't see it, it's gone!!!!



The oil slick in the Gulf of Mexico appears to be dissolving far more rapidly than anyone expected, a piece of good news that raises tricky new questions about how fast the government should scale back its response to the Deepwater Horizon disaster.

The immense patches of surface oil that covered thousands of square miles of the gulf after the April 20 oil rig explosion are largely gone, though sightings of tar balls and emulsified oil continue here and there.

Reporters flying over the area Sunday spotted only a few patches of sheen and an occasional streak of thicker oil, and radar images taken since then suggest that these few remaining patches are quickly breaking down in the warm surface waters of the gulf.

John Amos, president of SkyTruth, an environmental advocacy group that sharply criticized the early, low estimates of the size of the BP leak, noted that no oil had gushed from the well for nearly two weeks.

“Oil has a finite life span at the surface,” Mr. Amos said Tuesday, after examining fresh radar images of the slick. “At this point, that oil slick is really starting to dissipate pretty rapidly.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/28/us/28spill.html?ref=global-home&pagewanted=print