Vice president to assess oil spill efforts in Gulf area

New Orleans, Louisiana (News Today) - Vice President Joe Biden is expected to visit the Gulf area Tuesday to assess efforts to stop the massive oil spill.

Biden is expected to visit the command center in New Orleans and the Florida panhandle, the White House said.

Biden will also tour areas with Navy Secretary Ray Mabus, who has also been in the area recently.

His visit will be on the 71st day of the spill that President Barack Obama has called the nation's worst environmental disaster.

BP said it is on track to reach its August deadline of getting a relief well down to the area where the oil is leaking in the Gulf of Mexico.

The relief well has reached a depth of 16,770 feet, but engineers plan to drill an additional 900 feet vertically before cutting in sideways, said Kent Wells, BP senior vice president of exploration and production.

Meanwhile, efforts continue to increase the containment of leaking oil. The next step is to bring in a third rig called the Helix Producer at the well, which would increase the containment by 20,000 to 25,000 more barrels per day, Wells said.

But powerful Tropical Storm Alex could derail the effort.

The storm is expected to strengthen into a hurricane as it churned in the Gulf of Mexico, but was heading away from the oil spill area, the National Hurricane Center said Monday.

If the storm's approach were to force the evacuation of the site, "there could be a break of about 14 days to take down the equipment and then bring it back," said Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen, who is coordinating the federal response to the disaster.

Researchers have estimated that between 35,000 barrels (about 1.5 million gallons) and 60,000 barrels (about 2.5 million gallons) of oil are gushing into the ocean every day.

As of midnight Sunday, 438,000 barrels of oil and gas had been collected BP said.

But even with BP feverishly trying to contain it, more and more oil seems to wash up on the coasts of some Gulf states.

Connie Moran, the mayor of Ocean Springs, Mississippi, said she was going to have to close a beach in her town Tuesday.

"What we're seeing actually is minimal tar balls anywhere from a penny to half-a-dollar size. They are tacky," she said.

Source : CNN

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