Russian oil tanker crew freed from pirates

(News Today) - A Russian warship has freed the crew of an oil tanker seized by pirates in the Gulf of Aden a day earlier, the European Union naval force said Thursday.

No one was injured in the early morning rescue operation by the Marshal Shaposhnikov.

"The Marshal Shaposhnikov was ... fired upon by the pirates holding the ship. The Russian warship ... returned fire," the naval force reported. "Eventually the pirates surrendered and a boarding team from the Marshal Shaposhnikov arrived onboard the tanker, captured all the pirates and freed the crew."

The Russian-operated tanker Moscow University, which sails under the Liberian flag, has a crew of 23. It was on its way to China when pirates hijacked it Wednesday, the naval force said.

The captured pirates could face charges of group piracy with the use of violence and weapons, an offense carrying a maximum penalty of up to 15 years in prison, according to Vladimir Markin, a spokesman for the Investigation Committee of the Prosecutor General's Office.

Farther south off the coast of Tanzania, pirates failed in their attempt Wednesday to hijack a South Korean-flagged vessel, the naval force said. All those on board are reported to be well, it said.

EU NAVFOR escorts merchant vessels carrying humanitarian aid in the region and protects other vulnerable vessels in the Gulf of Aden and Indian Ocean.

Pirate attacks are frequent in the Gulf of Aden, which lies between Yemen and Somalia at the northwest corner of the Indian Ocean.

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Nigerian President Yar'Adua has died

Lagos, Nigeria (News Today) - Nigeria's ailing President Umaru Yar'Adua, who gave amnesty to armed militants in the troubled oil-rich Niger Delta region, died Wednesday, the country's information minister said. He was 58.

Yar'Adua had not been seen in public since November, when he went to Saudi Arabia for treatment of an inflammation of tissue around his heart. He was diagnosed with that condition, acute pericarditis, last fall after he complained of chest pain.

He returned to Nigeria in February but had remained out of sight.

Vice President Goodluck Jonathan has served as the country's acting leader since Yar'Adua fell ill.

Yar'Adua took office in 2007 in an election mired in controversy and accusations of vote-rigging.

"There was ballot snatching, voters were molested, voters were beaten ... and also payment inducement to vote for certain candidates," said Eneruvie Enakoko of the Civil Liberties Organization, a human rights group in Lagos.

The president, a soft-spoken and unassuming figure who did not bask in the media spotlight like past leaders of the West African nation, pledged to fight to improve the country of 150 million people despite the accusations.

"Our collective goal is to deliver for our children a Nigeria better, stronger, more peaceful, more secure and more prosperous than we met it," Yar'Adua said.

President Barack Obama issued a statement late Wednesday expressing his condolences to Yar'Adua's family and the Nigerian people.

"President Yar'Adua worked to promote peace and stability in Africa through his support of Nigerian peacekeeping efforts as well as his strong criticism of undemocratic actions in the region," Obama said in the statement. "He was committed to creating lasting peace and prosperity within Nigeria's own borders, and continuing that work will be an important part of honoring his legacy."

His election followed wide support from his predecessor, leading critics to label him a puppet of the former president, Olusegun Obasanjo.

After he was elected, Yar'Adua replaced some of Obasanjo's top officials, including the head of the army, a move analysts said was aimed at shedding off his predecessor's influence.

One of Yar'Adua's biggest successes was offering amnesty to militants in the troubled oil-rich Niger Delta region, a move that brought fragile peace to the area after years of conflict. The well-armed Niger Delta rebels have been battling Nigeria's armed forces over oil profits, which they say are unequally distributed.

While he has hospitalized in Saudi Arabia, the militants called off the truce, dealing a blow to plans to end violence that has crippled oil production in the nation.

Analysts say he did little to institutionalize reform in a country where two-thirds of the population lives on less than a dollar a day.

"Because many people feel disillusioned economically and as long as they have those sentiments -- I think the risk of radical uprisings in places like northern Nigeria and certainly southern Nigeria in the Delta will continue regardless of who is in power," said Rolake Akinola, an analyst at Control Risks West Africa.

Yar'Adua, a former chemistry teacher, was married twice and has nine children.

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Obama was top recipient of BP-related dollars in 2008

Washington (News Today) - As petroleum giant BP comes under congressional scrutiny as its ruptured oil rig pumps thousands of barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico, its political contributions are being scrutinized, too.

The top recipient of BP-related donations during the 2008 presidential election was Barack Obama, who collected $71,000, according to the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics.

When questioned about the donations Wednesday, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs made a point of noting that the money came from employees and not the company itself.

White House spokesman Ben LaBolt added that Obama wasn't tied to big oil companies.

"This claim lacks one thing: credibility," LaBolt said in a statement. "President Obama didn't accept a dime from corporate PACs or federal lobbyists during his presidential campaign. He raised $750 million from nearly 4 million Americans. And since he became President, he rolled back tax breaks and giveaways for the oil and gas industry, spearheaded a G20 agreement to phase out fossil fuel subsidies, and made the largest investment in American history in clean energy incentives."

BP employees gave more than $3 million in campaign contributions during the past decade and almost $110,000 in 2010.

Fifty-seven percent of BP's contributions went to Republicans, while 43 percent went to Democrats.

BP America President Lamar McKay has been asked to appear next week to discuss the oil spill before the House Energy and Commerce Committee, whose members received the largest share of BP's campaign contributions over the last two election cycles, the Center for Responsive Politics notes.

"In 2009, individuals and political action committees associated with BP donated $16,000 to members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee," the center found.

The center says five of the top 10 recipients of BP dollars in the House sit on that committee: John Dingell, D-Michigan; Joe Barton, R-Texas; Ralph Hall, R-Texas; Roy Blunt, R-Missouri; and Fred Upton, R-Michigan.

"All have received upward of $13,000 from BP-related individuals and political action committees during the past two decades," according to the Center for Responsive Politics. "Dingell, the second most favored recipient of BP money in the House, has received $31,000."

Congress is demanding answers in its investigation of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, and the BP executives likely to be grilled in the weeks ahead are no strangers to the ways of Washington.

"If BP faces heavy federal scrutiny, it's well-positioned to fight back: The London-based company has consistently spent top dollar to influence legislative and regulatory activity in Washington, D.C.," according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

The company spent almost $16 million lobbying Congress in 2009 and more than $3.5 million this year, the center found.

BP's ruptured undersea well off Louisiana continues to spew about 210,000 gallons -- or 5,000 barrels -- of crude a day into the Gulf of Mexico. Efforts to corral the rapidly growing spill have been unsuccessful.

There is a sheen of oil up to 60 miles across in the Gulf, threatening the coasts of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama as well as the Florida Panhandle, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The overall area affected by the spill, CNN estimates, is almost as large as the state of Delaware.

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Does the oil spill put seafood restaurants at risk?

(News Today) - The "single best bite of food" in Louisiana, according to Tommy Cvitanovich, is the charbroiled oyster soaked in butter, garlic and cheese. Then the tough little mollusk is grilled to a smoky perfection.

His two restaurants, both named Drago's, served 3 million of these delectable oysters last year.

Cvitanovich continues to serve the popular oysters to his customers. But with the oil spill disaster looming toward the Gulf Coast waters abundant with seafood, he and other restaurant owners are bracing for the worst possibilities: a shortage of seafood, price hikes and a public misperception that Louisiana seafood is dangerous.

"Everything in Louisiana is at risk right now," said the 51-year-old Cvitanovich. "Virtually every meal that comes from our kitchen is seafood. I am worried about the availability, the quality, the price."

It's too early to determine what impact April's deadly BP oil rig explosion will have on the nation's seafood and the restaurant industry. So far, precautionary fishing closures means there are fewer places to harvest seafood. That could be troubling news to a domestic seafood industry that has been pummeled by cheaper imports in recent years.

This week, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration began restricting for 10 days commercial and recreational fishing along the Gulf Coast, an area that spans about 6,800 miles. Louisiana closed areas designated for special shrimping on Tuesday.

As officials are scrambling to contain the mushrooming leak, some restaurant owners are fretting about what it would mean for their businesses if oysters, shrimp, crab and finfish were not as available.

Depending on the season, about 40 percent of the nation's commercial seafood harvests come from the Gulf Coast, according to NOAA data from 2008.

"The Gulf Coast is such an important biologic and economic area in term of seafood production and recreational fishing," said Roy Crabtree, NOAA Fisheries Southeast regional administrator.

The National Restaurant Association, a group representing 380,000 restaurants across the country, has heard some complaints from restaurants in the New Orleans area. Restaurants in states far from the spill are even calling to stay updated on the availability of seafood, said Annika Stensson, a spokeswoman for the National Restaurant Association.

She said it's premature to conclusively determine effects of the oil spill but predicts the accident will impact the "supply and price of seafood for restaurants nationwide that serve products from this area."

"We are watching the situation for sure," she said. "We have heard some grumbling from some of our members in the Gulf Coast area."

Concerns are mounting rapidly in Louisiana where seafood is the lifeblood of the economy and culinary culture. Seafood recipes there are like an art form, ingrained into family cookbooks, passed down from one generation to the next, locals proudly say. Fried oyster Po-Boys (breadcrumb-crusted oysters inside two slices of French bread) and barbeque shrimp (a Louisiana classic where shrimp is dripped in pepper, Worchester sauce and butter) are among many of the famous dishes.

From the fisherman to the restaurant owners, they all depend on the availability of seafood from the Gulf.

Louisiana's seafood industry reels in $2.4 billion dollars annually. Louisiana ranks behind only one state -- Alaska -- when it comes to total commercial seafood production. Louisiana remains the No. 1 producer of shrimp, blue crab meat, and oysters, said Ewell Smith, executive director of the Louisiana Seafood Promotion & Marketing Board.

The potential damage from the oil slick threatens as the state is battling the recession. Even worse, the summer months are typically the peak shrimping season for fishermen.

A majority -- about 70 percent -- of Louisiana's waters remain open for fishing, Smith said. For example, only six of the 32 oyster beds in Louisiana are prohibited from being harvested, but the rest are open to fisherman.

"The amount of impact has been minimal at this point," Smith said. "But if this thing [oil slick] sticks around, then we could have another scenario."

Louisiana restaurants may eventually feel the trickle-down effect from the spill, but most haven't experienced immediate impacts, said Wendy Waren, a spokeswoman at Louisiana Restaurant Association. Her association represents 7,500 restaurants in the state, and about two-thirds of them serve some kind of seafood.

Waren is anticipating a swarm of seafood festivals to continue this year with strong attendance, including the New Orleans Oyster Festival in June.

Only fishing zones east of the mouth of the Mississippi River have been shut off, closing off about 30 percent of the supply, experts say. In areas where fishing is no longer allowed, the impact is felt mostly by fishermen and dock workers who are unemployed.

"They cannot do their jobs and there is a domino effect here," said Amy Evans Streeter, an oral historian at Southern Foodways Alliance. "No jobs equals no money equals unpaid bills and struggling families."

Another big concern among restaurant goers and seafood lovers is whether the Gulf seafood is safe to consume. The NOAA has assured consumers the seafood products will be carefully inspected by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

"Don't worry about any of the products in retail stores" says Steven Wilson, chief quality officer of the seafood inspection program at the United States Department of Commerce. "This was all harvested and processed prior to the storm."

At Tommy Cvitanovich's restaurants Drago's, a New Orleans-area staple for 41 years, menu specialties like the shrimp and eggplant stack and the oyster pasta rely on locally harvested seafood. On Monday, despite the spill scare, he placed his bid on shrimp for the month of May. He said prices remained the same and the seafood was just as attainable as the month before.

So far, consumers have no need to worry or to stock up on Gulf seafood, fishing experts say. Seafood prices haven't spiked. Oysters, shrimp, and crabs are still available, say David Laverne, an economist with the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries.

Laverne is still uncertain what will happen in the short term but says a price increase could happen, though he doesn't know how much. He pointed out that seafood imports could also curb shortages.

Environmental damage is also raising concerns. If the oil were to seep into Louisiana's precious estuaries that serve as nurseries for shrimp and other wildlife, the damage could affect future seafood production for years, said Martin Bourgeois, biologists with the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries.

While the consequences of the oil spill are unclear, Louisiana restaurant owners know one thing: If the public believes the seafood may be contaminated, it can kill their business.

It feels like déjà vu for New Orleans's chef Frank Brigtsen, 55, who owns two restaurants in the area. When Hurricane Katrina flood waters ravaged the area in 2005, customers avoided ordering seafood at restaurants even after the state declared the seafood safe, he said. The stubborn public misperceptions about seafood put some owners out of business.

"We learned from Katrina, it's never just one thing," he said. "Our economy is very complicated and if any part of that is hurt, we will all suffer."

But as long as the seafood continues to be safe and available, Brigtsen will happily serve his seafood platter. The combination platter, which changes with the fishing seasons, offers six kinds of seafood including grilled drum fish, crawfish with jalapeno lime sauce and shrimp cornbread.

It's a dish he calls "a celebration of Louisiana seafood."

Source : CNN

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Ex-FEMA chief: Obama using oil spill to his advantage

(News Today) - Former FEMA director Michael Brown is not backing off his charge that the Obama administration wants to use the Gulf Coast oil spill as a plot to put an end to offshore drilling.

"They want a crisis like this, so that they can use a crisis like this to shut down offshore and gas drilling," he said Tuesday night on CNN's "AC 360°."

His remarks came a day after he told Fox News' "Your World with Neil Cavuto" that the oil slick is "exactly what they want, because now he can pander to the environmentalists and say, 'I'm going to shut it down because it's too dangerous.' While Mexico and China and everybody else drills in the Gulf, we're going to get shut down."

Pressed by CNN for evidence to back up his claim, Brown pointed to an interview that then-Sen. Barack Obama gave to The San Francisco Chronicle in January 2008. Obama told the Chronicle editorial board that he wanted cap-and-trade legislation to be as strong as possible.

"So if somebody wants to build a coal-powered plant, they can. It's just that it will bankrupt them because they're going to be charged a huge sum for all that greenhouse gas that's being emitted," Obama told the board, after discussing the importance of figuring out how to use coal without emitting greenhouse gases.

Brown told CNN that he didn't mean to imply the administration wanted the slick to spread, but he suggested that the White House was exaggerating the ramifications of the spill by claiming the damage would last forever.

"Look, when you have an administration who is leading the country, and their political position is that we want to move away from a carbon-based energy supply to something else, this crisis occurs, the Rahm Emanuel rule No. 1 of never letting a crisis go to waste kicks in, and they have done that," Brown said.

At the daily White House news briefing on Tuesday, Press Secretary Robert Gibbs slammed Fox's "very special and unique interview" with Brown, which he said "didn't appear to be pushed back on real hard."

Gibbs' criticism came after Fox News reporter Wendell Goler started to ask a question about critics referring to the spill as Obama's "Katrina."

"Can I say this?," Gibbs interrupted. "You opened both the double doors and, voilà, here I am."

Goler pointed out that the networks' reporters and television personalities are not one in the same.

"You should call headquarters, my friend," Gibbs said. "Ask for somebody who makes the decisions to put people like that -- because I've got to tell you, Wendell, I'm not entirely sure that a factual answer that I might give to any one of your questions is going to change the notion that your network put out the former FEMA director to make an accusation that the well had been purposely set off in order to change an offshore drilling decision."

Brown headed FEMA under the Bush administration and resigned in September 2005, two weeks after Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast. His resignation came 10 days after President Bush famously told him, "Brownie, you're doing a heck of a job."

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Oil slick targeted with steel, fire

(News Today) - Authorities battled the Gulf of Mexico's massive oil spill with sweat, steel and fire Wednesday as patches of oil crept to within two miles of the Louisiana bayous.

Two specially equipped "burn rigs" set fire to patches of crude oil near the ruptured undersea well at the heart of the spill, a BP executive said Wednesday afternoon. At the same time, a four-story containment vessel was loaded aboard a barge in Port Fourchon, Louisiana, en route to the well, the first step in an attempt to capture the leaking oil at an unprecedented depth. And thousands of volunteers, wildlife officials, idled fishermen and National Guard troops mobilized to string floating booms along the beaches and across the mouths of estuaries leading toward the Gulf.

Latest updates on oil spill

The outer sheen of oil was reported to be "very close" to the Chandeleur Islands and the Mississippi River delta in southeastern Louisiana, Coast Guard Rear Adm. Mary Landry told reporters. And an oyster fisherman spotted a large patch of oil sheen near the border between St. Bernard and Plaquemines parishes, about 40 miles southeast of New Orleans, Plaquemines Parish President Billy Nungesser said.

"It's disturbing, but it's two miles away from shore, so it's not devastating," Nungesser said. He said authorities have conceded that the oil spill will reach the state's barrier islands, but, "We've got to keep it out of the marsh."

Landry said the heavier concentrations of crude remained further offshore, and the latest predictions from the federal government said the weather would keep it largely stationary for the next three days.

The 72-hour forecast shows winds shifting to the south and blowing about 10 to 15 knots (12-17 mph), which is likely to produce only "a little bit of movement on the fringes," said Charlie Henry of the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration.

"Nothing's changing real fast this week," Henry said.

The oil stretched from Louisiana's Breton and Chandeleur sounds, on the northeast side of the Mississippi Delta, to about 60 miles off Pensacola, Florida, Wednesday afternoon.

WDSU-TV: Fishermen to help in cleanup efforts

With the undersea gusher dumping an estimated 210,000 gallons (5,000 barrels) of crude into the Gulf every day, BP -- which, as the well owner, is responsible for the cleanup -- plans to ship its newly fabricated containment vessel to the area and lower it atop a ruptured pipe this week.

The hope is that the four-story-high structure will collect the leaking oil, which would then be sucked up to a drill ship on the surface. If the operation is successful, BP plans to deploy a second, smaller container to deal with a second leak in the ruptured pipe, the company has said.

But getting the large structure into position could take several days, and the technique has never been attempted at the depth of these leaks, cautioned Doug Suttles, BP's chief operating officer.

"If all goes according to plan, we should begin the process of processing the fluid and stop the spilling to the sea on Monday," he said. But he added, "It's very complex, and it will likely have challenges along the way."

Watch as BP exec expresses confidence in the cleanup effort Video

In the meantime, booms, skimmers and chemical dispersants were being used to corral and break up the oil before it hits the sensitive wetlands of Louisiana or the beaches of Mississippi, Alabama and Florida further east. Suttles said controlled burns were being carried out at two locations near the heaviest concentrations of oil Wednesday afternoon, the first such attempt in a week. A previous attempt at a controlled burn destroyed about 100 barrels of oil on the surface of the water.

The efforts come amid rising concern that the oil could kill wildlife and damage livelihoods for thousands of people along in the Gulf states. Parish and state officials in Louisiana have enacted plans to keep the oil out of the marshes at the heart of the state's fishing industry and wildlife habitat.

"If it gets back into the backwaters, into the bayous, that's where we'll kill off the food chain," Nungesser told reporters. "That's where it will devastate southern Louisiana for years to come, and we will lose our heritage in the fishing industry."

Watch how the oil slick is a threat to marine life Video

The timing of the spill "couldn't be worse for the bird populations in this region," said Ken Rosenberg, a bird expert at Cornell University.

"It's peak nesting season for thousands of brown pelicans, which have just recently come off the endangered species list," he said Wednesday on CNN's "American Morning." It's also peak migration season for birds coming to the Gulf of Mexico from Central and South America, he added.

At least two oil-covered birds, one of them a brown pelican, have been found offshore, the National Wildlife Federation reported Tuesday. In addition, the conservation group reported finding a loggerhead turtle -- a threatened species -- gasping for air in the oil slick about 65 miles off the mouth of the Mississippi River.

BP, which is responsible for containing and cleaning up the spill, has also deployed thousands of gallons of chemical dispersants in an effort to break up the oil. But the dispersants are not necessarily a cure-all, Rosenberg warned.

"Dispersants are keeping the oil out in the water and down under the water," he said. "Almost certainly it's going to have major effects down in the water to the marine life and, ultimately, this is the same marine life on which the birds and animals on the surface are dependent.

"So just because we are not seeing oil washing ashore does not mean there aren't major effects happening out in the water," he said.

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, whose Cabinet agency oversees both national parks and offshore oil exploration, visited the scene Wednesday. He told reporters that federal authorities "continue to do everything we can" to keep pressure on BP, which is responsible for the cleanup, and to protect fish and wildlife in the threatened area.

Salazar said the Obama administration remains committed to developing diverse U.S. energy sources, but "there are risks inherent in whatever we do."

"Having said that, I think an incident of this size needs to be an incident from which we learn, so that there is never another incident like this," he said.

The Obama administration supports increasing how much companies responsible for oil spills have to pay in damages, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said Wednesday.

Current law requires companies to pay all costs of cleaning up the spill but limits the liability on damages -- such as economic loss -- to $75 million.

Asked by reporters about pending legislation that would increase the damages limit, Gibbs said the White House supported the idea. However, he refused to provide a specific ceiling figure.

"We would be in favor of lifting that cap," Gibbs said, noting the current limit comes from legislation dating back 20 years.

A bill being introduced in Congress proposes lifting the cap on economic damages to $10 billion, and making the change retroactive to include the current Gulf of Mexico oil spill.

Despite the current cap, Gibbs said that oil giant BP will be responsible for paying all cleanup costs and damages.

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Oil laps barrier islands; BP grilled about oil spill at Capitol

New Orleans, Louisiana (News Today) - The edges of the massive Gulf Coast oil slick grazed the barrier islands off Louisiana's Chandeleur and Breton sounds Tuesday as the company responsible for cleaning up the spill faced tough questions from members of Congress.

With a damaged undersea well still spewing crude oil into the Gulf of Mexico, Louisiana's coastal parishes made new plans to keep the oil from moving into Lake Borgne and Lake Pontchartrain, which flank New Orleans. Winds that complicated efforts to fight the spill died down Tuesday, making cleanup work easier, Coast Guard Rear Adm. Mary Landry said.

"It's a gift of a little bit of time," she told reporters. "But I'm not resting."

The spill threatens wildlife, beaches and livelihoods along the Gulf Coast. Already federal officials have banned fishing in the affected area until at least May 12, curtailing a commercial seafood industry that brings in about $2.4 billion to the region every year. The leading edge of the slick was reported to be lapping at the edge of Louisiana's Chandeleur Islands early Tuesday, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal said.

"Let's make no mistake about what's at stake here. This is our very way of life," Jindal told reporters. "This is our fishing communities, these are some of our coastal communities. We're talking about keeping this oil out of our fragile wetlands."

But as of mid-afternoon, no oil had been found washed up on the islands, said Doug Suttles, chief operating officer for BP, which owns the damaged well.

"To give you a sense of our ability to respond, we launched 22 vessels," Suttles told reporters at a news conference in Mobile, Alabama. Twelve of those vessels were shrimp boats whose skippers have volunteered to assist in the cleanup, he said.

"They've been in the area ever since trying to locate that oil and make sure it actually doesn't reach shore," Suttles said.

The edge of the slick was reported to be about 20 miles off the Mississippi Coast, and Landry said it was about 30 miles off the shores of Alabama. Suttles said BP workers expected to close off one of the three leaking points Tuesday, but added, "I don't believe that will change the total amount of oil that will be leaked."

Stephen Herbert, chef and owner of Abita Springs Cafe on the north shore of Lake Pontchartrain, said the potential impact was "tremendous." But Herbert, who holds a degree in fish biology and lived in the marshes for 10 years before entering the restaurant business, expressed surprise that the story has become a national one.

"I'm really astounded that the rest of the people in the United States really give a flip about this," he said. Louisiana's coastal marshlands have been shrinking at the rate of two football fields a day for a quarter-century, he said, "and nobody gave a flip about that."

Herbert's 16-table restaurant, located 25 miles from New Orleans, specializes in Cajun food, and at least half of his orders are for meals that contain fish. In anticipation of rising prices, he ordered an extra gallon of shucked oysters and another case of shrimp, but that was all his refrigerators could store, the 56-year-old restaurateur said.

The estimated 210,000-gallon-per-day flow of oil from the damaged well continued unabated Tuesday, 12 days after the drilling rig Deepwater Horizon sank off Louisiana. The break in the winds kept the slick from advancing much toward the coast, but Jindal said the weather is expected to turn unfavorably Thursday.

The first oil was not expected to reach the shores of the U.S. mainland for another three days, Suttles said.

As owner of the well, BP is responsible for the cleanup and its costs. It blames Transocean, which it hired to drill the well, for the failure of a critical piece of equipment that was designed to shut off the well in case of emergency.

Across the Gulf Coast, emergency workers and volunteers helped string floating booms across inlets and beaches in an attempt to fend off any advancing oil. Chocolate-colored streaks of oily water could be seen off Dauphin Island, on the Alabama coast. And crew boats that normally supply oil wells were laying booms around Ship Island, off the shores of Mississippi and about 10 miles north of the spill's leading edge.

But Capt. Louis Skrmetta, who runs excursions out to the Mississippi Sound barrier islands, said efforts to protect the islands and waterways were inadequate. He said Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour -- who called the spill "a manageable problem" Monday -- was doing less to combat the oncoming slick than his counterparts in Alabama and Louisiana.

KNOE: Community rallies around rig families

"The governor's leaving it up to BP. They're just not doing enough," Skrmetta said.

BP hopes to place a four-story-high metal container over part of the leaking drill pipe, a step it says could corral about 80 percent of the leaking oil. The oil would then be pumped to a drill ship on the surface.

Suttles said the 70-ton box could be ferried out to the site of the leak by midnight Wednesday, but it will take another two days to place the device on the seabed. Then it must be connected to the drill ship.

"Hopefully, we'll be operational within about about six days," he said.

Hundreds of thousands of feet of booms have been strung around the estuaries of southeastern Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and far western Florida in recent days. But an aerial tour conducted by the Coast Guard on Tuesday showed some have already given way, and high winds in recent days have driven oil past others.

The Deepwater Horizon caught fire April 20 and burned for two days before sinking, with 11 workers presumed dead. Executives from BP and Transocean Ltd., looked "like deer in the headlights" when they briefed members of the House Energy and Environment committee about the accident and response on Tuesday, said Rep. Joe Barton, R-Texas.

KATC: Gulf shrimp season to temporarily close

Barton is a strong supporter of offshore drilling, and told reporters he didn't want the accident to reverse support for more exploration off the U.S. coasts. But he said he had hoped for "more concrete" answers from the oilmen.

"I have concerns in this particular case about the attention to safety, the attention to maintenance, the attention to using best available control technology and best monitoring practices," Barton said.

Rep. Edward Markey, D-Massachusetts, said the situation could get dramatically worse. "One of the questions which I asked was what would happen if a worst-case scenario did unfold?" he told reporters after the hearing. "I was told that the amount of oil per day could actually rise from 5,000 to 60,000 barrels of oil a day, although in a worst-case scenario, the most likely number was in the 40,000 barrel range, which only reinforces the necessity of us acting as quickly as possible, for BP and all responsible, for shutting off this catastrophic leak of oil."

But Dave Nagel, the executive vice president of BP America, said the company is "doing everything we can to respond to this incident."

"That's our complete focus right now -- to stop the leak at the scene, to disperse the oil the best we can and protect the beaches and mitigate the impact," he said. "That's what we're doing."

That may not be enough to satisfy lawmakers, said Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Florida. "Privately, I've gone up to some senators who have been for drilling and I have sarcastically said to them, in a whisper, 'Drill, baby, drill,' and they roll their eyes as if in mock horror at the possibilities of what could happen as a result of this disaster."

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Consequences of spills can last for decades

(News Terupdate) - As oil began approaching the coast of the United States, environmental scientists said the effects of the spill in the Gulf of Mexico could have ecological and biological consequences for years, if not decades.

The intricate ecosystem is a major source of seafood for the United States and hundreds of species of animals and plants are at risk, experts said.

Some areas in the path of the slick are particularly sensitive to problems because unlike the rocky coast of Alaska hit by oil from the Exxon Valdez disaster, much of the coastline that will be hit by the BP spill consists of marshy areas where the water is calmer and more difficult to clean.

The marshes are in extreme danger, said a biologist with the University of Houston who studies coastal wetlands.

"It's likely going to persist for decades because it will get into the marsh where there is very little wave action and the soil is oxygen poor," said Steve Pennings. "The immediate acute impact might not be that severe because there is not much oil getting to a certain spot, but because the oil might stick around [in the sediment] for 20 years you might have a real chronic effect."

The oil spill started April 20 after an explosion on the BP-operated Deepwater Horizon drilling platform in the Gulf of Mexico. Eleven oil-rig workers remain missing and are presumed dead. The rig sank April 22 about 50 miles off the southeast coast of Louisiana and the untapped wellhead is gushing oil into the Gulf. About 1.6 million gallons of oil have spilled since the explosion, the Coast Guard said.

Wetlands in Louisiana and other Gulf Coast states were already struggling because of sea-level rise and the lack of sediment due to some rivers being channelized, Pennings said.

Mike Beck, senior scientist on the global marine team for the Nature Conservancy, said there is a lot of concern for oyster reefs, which were also already suffering. Only 15 percent of the world's oyster reefs remain because of over-harvesting and dredging, he said, and hurricanes have also destroyed some reefs. He said there have been some oil spills in Europe that provide clues as to what might happen.

"What we have learned from other accidents is we've seen mortality and then we have seen lower growth rate," he said, "so that even if they're not killed, you are likely to have much lower [population] growth. We're not likely to be able to eat those oysters for quite some time because ... they hold heavy metals in their tissue."

He estimated that the damage to the reefs could last two to five years, but that other oil spills have shown that in some instances it can be longer than that.

Beck pointed out that 40 percent of the U.S. seafood supply comes from the northern Gulf of Mexico and 95 percent of the species in the seafood harvest are dependent on the health of the nation's estuaries and marshes.

Environmentalist Richard Charter of the Defenders of Wildlife organization said the size of the oil spill will be overwhelming to cleanup crews.

"This event is a self-feeding fire," Charter said. "It is so big and expanding so fast that it's pretty much beyond human response that can be effective. ... You're looking at a long-term poisoning of the area. Ultimately, this will have a multidecade impact."

Some officials worried the destruction could surpass the Exxon Valdez disaster of 20 years ago. That oil tanker ran aground on the Bligh Reef in Alaska's Prince William Sound in 1989 and spilled 11 million gallons of crude oil.

The surface oil from the Exxon Valdez spill had largely disappeared within three years of the spill, according to studies conducted by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Office of Response and Restoration. The 1997 report said that what oil did remain could be found on beaches that were near still water. The residual oil was not nearly as toxic as the oil studied in the days after the spill. The report said "intertidal species can tolerate its presence even though it can accumulate in their tissues."

However, a 2003 study published in the journal Science disputed the NOAA finding of toxicity and said that oil in the sediment was still harming the species more than a decade after the accident.

The Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Trustees Council also disagreed. A spokeswoman told the Anchorage Daily News last year that oil in some parts of the sound is still toxic.

All the scientists CNN spoke to said that the long-term impacts of the spill depend on how much oil reaches the coast. The choppy seas are hindering containment efforts, experts said.

"The question is -- we rarely clean up more than 15 or 20 percent of a spill on a calm day, and we aren't seeing a calm day," Charter said.

The impact will also depend on what states are hit. Beck said there are two major loop currents and one runs along the Louisiana wetlands past Mississippi and Alabama then down the coast of Florida and around the Keys.

"Eventually that water moves out into the Caribbean and the Atlantic," he said, indicating the East Coast needs to pay attention to where the oil is traveling.

Source : CNN

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Gulf Coast residents brace for slow-motion oil disaster

Washington (News Terupdate) - Nearly two weeks after an explosion aboard an oil rig caused a leak from an undersea oil well off Louisiana, the impact is just beginning to unfold.

Though the widening pool of oil remained offshore Monday, it was already a presence for some coastal areas. John Kelly, administrator of Gulfport, Mississippi, said he had been able to smell it since Friday.

"I got $3 million worth of boats sitting here," said Capt. Louis Skrmetta, who ferries tourists from Gulfport to the state's pristine barrier islands. "What am I going to do with them?"

BP's ruptured undersea well continues to spew about 210,000 gallons -- or 5,000 barrels -- of crude per day into the Gulf of Mexico. Efforts to contain or curtail the spill have been unsuccessful.

The sheen extends up to 60 miles across and threatens the coasts of Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama, as well as the Florida Panhandle, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. That's an area nearly as large as the state of Delaware. The slick was nine miles off the Louisiana coast Monday, said Adm. Thad Allen, commandant of the U.S. Coast Guard and incident commander.

BP chief executive Tony Hayward vowed that the oil giant would "absolutely be paying for the cleanup operation" of the oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico.

"Where legitimate claims are made, we will be good for them," he told NPR's "Morning Edition."

The U.S. government was leaving little to chance. Attorney General Eric Holder said Monday that Justice Department employees were in the Gulf region "to ensure that BP is held liable."

Allen said BP "is the responsible party" and "will bear all the costs" of the cleanup.

Still, the promises failed to quell the fears. "I hope we can weather the storm," said Keith Delcambre, owner of seafood market Bozo's in Pascagoula, Mississippi.

WLOX: Pass Christian Harbor in Mississippi prepares for oil

He said the nature of the current disaster could exact more of a toll on seafood than Hurricane Katrina, which savaged the Gulf Coast in August 2005. "We weathered Katrina, but shrimp after Katrina was good," he said. "Seafood after Katrina was good. With all the oil out there, I don't know what to expect. This is brand new."

In Gulfport, officials worried that a drop in tourism from the slick would chill the city's post-Katrina rebound, which includes half a billion dollars in new construction, $30 million of which has been spent on the harbor.

"This could not have happened at a worse time in our history," Kelly, the city's administrator, said.

Katrina left equipment operator Daniel Schepens out of work for a month, but the oil slick could prove worse, he said. "The warehouses are empty. No trucks, no imports, no exports."

"If it threatens the commercial sea lanes, that's a concern, because if ships don't come in and ships aren't able to go out, that stops commerce," said Donald Allee, CEO of the Mississippi State Port Authority.

WWL: Fishermen try to help contain oil slick

For now, the harbor is being used as a loading point for hundreds of miles of booms that are intended to defend against the slick's arrival.

But the booms may not protect the coast any more than the levees protected New Orleans during Katrina: Rough seas have already broken apart some of the booms.

WDSU: Rush to save Lake Pontchartrain

Meanwhile, Florida Gov. Charlie Crist on Monday extended a state of emergency to 13 coastal counties in his state and said he might extend it to two more on Tuesday.

He had issued an emergency declaration last week for six counties on the western end of the Florida Panhandle; Monday's declaration added the rest of the Panhandle, and counties on the Gulf Coast of the main Florida peninsula as far south as Sarasota.

"In the event that the oil does come to our shores, I want us to be ahead of it as much as humanly possible," he told reporters.

Preparations continue on strategies to stop the leak, though each plan has drawbacks. One plan is to lower a dome over the wellhead next week to capture the spewing oil, said Florida Secretary of Environmental Protection Michael Sole. "That would stop the flow -- if successful," he said. "Unfortunately, it's never been tried at 5,000 feet below the surface of the water."

Officials warn of possible catastrophe

BP also is having a contractor drill a relief well that would allow workers to plug the first well.

"Unfortunately, that's a two- to three-month operation," Sole said.

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and other Obama White House officials met Monday afternoon with Hayward and BP America President Lamar McKay to discuss the response efforts.

On Sunday, federal officials banned fishing for at least 10 days in the northern Gulf of Mexico from the mouth of the Mississippi River in Louisiana to waters off Florida's Pensacola Bay. The Gulf Coast's commercial fishing industry brings in about $2.4 billion to the region.

WDSU: Oil spill closes fishing waters

The spill cast a pall over the annual boat blessing ceremony in St. Bernard, Louisiana, where fishermen have observed the tradition for decades to usher in the shrimp season.

On Monday, Sen. David Vitter, R-Louisiana, joined Plaquemines Parish President Billy Nungesser on a conference call with President Obama and Coast Guard officials.

Officials are fighting the spill on three fronts, Napolitano said Monday.

"One is to cap the well" that is leaking the oil, she said. Authorities are also fighting the slick at sea before it reaches land, and preparing to clean it up immediately if it does make landfall, she said.

In Venice, Louisiana, Obama told reporters Sunday that his administration has launched a "relentless response" to the spill, but the problem might not be solved for many days.

WDSU: Fishermen to help oil cleanup

The oil spill started April 20, after an explosion on BP contractor Transocean Ltd.'s Deepwater Horizon drilling platform left 11 men presumed dead.

The spill will have "a multidecade impact," a "long-term poisoning" of the area, said Richard Charter of the environmental group Defenders of Wildlife.

Booms were strung across the mouths of delta estuaries in Louisiana and inlets along the Mississippi coast.

In Alabama, National Guard troops helped lay them out off Dauphin Island, at the southern end of Mobile Bay.

The cause of the blast remains unknown.

BP says a device known as a "blowout preventer" failed and has not responded to repeated attempts to activate it using remotely operated submarines.

How the oil spill crisis could affect BP

Frustration with BP has been growing across the Gulf states, and Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal has said the company's response has been inadequate.

Some 200 vessels, including skimmers, tugboats and nine remotely operated underwater vehicles are on or near the site, BP's Chief Operating Officer Douglas Suttles told reporters.

BP spokeswoman Marti Powers said the company was trying to use the submarines to activate the blowout preventer at the ocean floor and spreading dispersants on and under the water to break up the slick.

The company has put out about 300,000 feet -- roughly 60 miles -- of floating booms to keep the oil away from ecologically sensitive shorelines, she said. But she said efforts to skim oil off the surface were put off because of bad weather.

"Some of the vessels can't get out," she said. "But they are still making the effort."

Source : CNN

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Could oil spill sap appetite for Obama's offshore drilling plans?

(News Terupdate) - A month after announcing plans to expand offshore drilling, President Obama visited ground zero of the Gulf Coast oil disaster and warned that residents could be facing a "potentially unprecedented environmental disaster."

"The oil that is still leaking from the well could seriously damage the economy and the environment of our Gulf states and it could extend for a long time. It could jeopardize the livelihoods of thousands of Americans who call this place home," Obama said Sunday in Venice, Louisiana.

The president reiterated that oil company BP is responsible for the leak and will foot the cost of the cleanup. He pledged to "spare no effort to respond to this crisis for as long as it continues."

Obama's remarks were a stark contrast from his late March proposal to open swaths of U.S. coastal waters in the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Mexico to oil and natural gas drilling.

Obama said then that the decision did not come lightly, but it was one that he approached with confidence.

"The bottom line is this: Given our energy needs, in order to sustain economic growth and produce jobs, and keep our businesses competitive, we are going to need to harness traditional sources of fuel even as we ramp up production of new sources of renewable, homegrown energy," he said as he unveiled his plans.

Obama said the federal government would begin the process of leasing some areas off the coasts of Virginia, Alaska and possibly Florida to oil companies for drilling.

New offshore drilling in most U.S. waters has been banned since the early 1980s, when mounting public pressure pushed lawmakers into action. A disastrous oil spill off the California coast in 1969 sparked protests that grew into a broader environmental movement, which eventually forced a drilling moratorium.

But as the environmental impact of the Gulf Coast spill comes ashore, the appetite for Obama's offshore drilling plan and the enthusiasm from administration officials appear to have subsided.

CNNMoney: Oil spill may threaten offshore drilling plans

"All he has said is that he's not going to continue the moratorium on drilling," White House senior adviser David Axelrod told ABC's "Good Morning America" on Friday. "No domestic drilling in new areas is going to go forward until there is an adequate review of what's happened here and of what is being proposed elsewhere."

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Sunday that moving ahead on offshore drilling is "going to require a balancing act."

"That is a national security concern because we have to do better to lessen our dependence on foreign oil. But it has to be done safely. It can't be done at the risk of having to spend billions of dollars cleaning up these spills," she said on NBC's "Meet the Press."

And Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said Sunday that the Gulf Coast disaster "sends out the clarion call that we need to diversify our energy resources."

"Our intention is to move forward thoughtfully, looking at how we can protect the resources of the United States and making thoughtful decisions," he said on CNN's "State of the Union," noting that deep-water drilling has been done thousands of times without incident.

Time.com: Obama promises help, but containing spill is still talk

Obama said Friday he still believes that domestic oil production is an important part of the strategy for energy security, but he added, "I've always said it must be done responsibly, for the safety of our workers and our environment."

The president ordered Salazar to conduct a review of the oil spill and report back in 30 days on what precautions, if any, should be required to prevent future accidents.

Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson of Florida has asked Obama to shelve his proposal, at least until the cause of the current spill is fully investigated.

In a letter to the president, Nelson also said he would file legislation "that would, for the time being, prohibit the Interior Department from acting on your administration's plans to expand offshore drilling, including seismic testing and other exploratory operations."

Florida Gov. Charlie Crist, who in the past has been a proponent of offshore drilling, told NBC's "Meet the Press" that such drilling has "got to be tabled, for sure."

White House press secretary Robert Gibbs indicated last week that Obama's offshore plans aren't set in stone.

"I think our focus right now is, one, the area, the spill, and two, also to ultimately determine the cause of it and see the impact that that ultimately may or may not have," he said, noting that Obama's announcement was the beginning, and not the end, of a longer process.

Source : CNN

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Indonesia and Malaysia to Deal with Campaigns against Palm Oil

Yogyakarta, Indonesia (News Today) - Indonesia and Malaysia, the world’s two largest palm oil producers, agreed at a meeting here on Thursday to deal with negative campaigns against the two countries’ palm oil industry.

"The meeting was called to face negative issues impeding the development of the two countries’ palm oil industry," Indonesian Agriculture Minister Suswono said following the fifth Indonesia-Malaysia joint committee meeting on bilateral cooperation here.

At the meeting, the two nations agreed to cooperate in developing palm oil, cocoa and pepper as well as in handling negative issues impeding the development of their farm products, he said. Indonesia and Malaysia now supply 85 percent of the world’s CPO needs.

Should the two neighboring nations unite they could play a decisive role in setting global CPO prices, Suswono said. But the negative campaigns accusing the two countries’ palm oil industry of destroying forests had posed an obstacle to the development of the industry, he said.

"That’s why Indonesia and Malaysia must cooperate in facing the negative campaigns launched by European non-governmental organizations," he said.

The cooperation would allow the setting up of a task force to voice the two countries’ common interests and convince the world that palm oil producers had adopted the best practices in developing palm oil industry, he said.

"The Indonesian government has adopted a firm policy in the development of palm oil plantations by banning the clearing of peat land with a depth of more than three meters for palm oil plantations," he said.

A number of NGOs including Greenpeace have claimed that some palm oil producers, including Golden Agri Resources and PT Sinar Mas Agro Resources and Technology, have been clearing peat land and conservation rain forests to expand plantations.

The companies have denied the claims. Meanwhile, Malaysian Minister of Plantation Industries and Commodities Tan Sri Bernard Dompok said the NGOs might not be well informed of the process of planting oil palm trees in the two countries so that they launched negative campaigns.

Source : kompas.com

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Oil wreaks havoc on Gulf Coast livelihoods before it arrives

(News Terupdate) - As Gulf Coast residents wait for a huge oil slick to reach their shores, the spill and the massive response already have begun wreaking havoc on livelihoods in a region where jobs are largely dependent on two ocean intensive industries: seafood and tourism.

Stephen Denmark, a city council member in Dauphin Island, Alabama, said Saturday that local scientists are predicting that the seafood crop could take a decade to recover from the oil slick.

"The last two years have been tough already," Denmark said, referring to the recession. "This will be catastrophic to the mom-and-pop businesses, which is 90 percent of the business down here on the island."

Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal said Saturday that heavy oil is likely to begin hitting the state's coast by Sunday or Monday.

U.S. Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Thad Allen -- the Obama administration's national incident commander for the slick -- said Saturday that oil also is likely to reach shorelines in Mississippi and Alabama in coming days.

But some Gulf Coast oyster beds and other seafood harvesting grounds are already awash in oil, according to Casi Callaway, executive director of the Alabama-based environmental group Mobile Baykeeper.

"It's already covering shrimp beds and shrimp grounds in the Gulf," she said. "So it's here and it's now and it's happening."

Callaway said that the oil could ruin oyster beds for up to two decades.

Forty percent of the fish harvested in the lower 48 states comes from the Gulf of Mexico.

Vacationers, meanwhile, spend billions of dollars every year in the region. But this week, many Americans canceled plans to travel to the Gulf Coast over the summer.

"I'm pretty much on pause right now ... it's just a big waiting game," said David Boola, a fisherman who leads boat trips out of Venice, Louisiana.

"I'm extremely worried because I have customers that [have] already canceled trips," Boola said Saturday. "I should be out taking people fishing today and I'm not. I'm not making money today. Or tomorrow. I'm worried about the 'now' factor, you know?"

Besides the oil, the deployment of hundreds of thousands of feet of floating booms along the Gulf Coast to protect sensitive land areas has kept many fishing boats tied up at the dock.

In Florida's Panhandle, where Saturday was the deadline for tourists to cancel summer plans at many hotels, phones were ringing off the hook.

"In the hurricane season, you know you can't stop the hurricane, but you can prepare ... and we're great at that," said Jewel Cannada-Wynn, deputy mayor of Pensacola, Florida. "But how do we deal with an oil spill? It's a helpless feeling."

Blows to seafood and tourism are likely to be felt in other industries in the Gulf Coast and beyond.

"It affects the people that truck it, the people that make the ice, the people that [provide] fuel -- the labor just to transport it is just monumental," said Denmark, describing the long chain of workers involved in harvesting and shipping seafood. "It's not just the people that catch it and process it."

Source : CNN

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Machines and microbes will clean up oil

(News Terupdate) - There's no way to stop oily water from reaching land along the Gulf Coast, but experts will use tools both massive and microscopic to clean it up.

Oil-soaked sand on beaches in the eastern Gulf Coast can be scooped up with heavy equipment, but the grassy marshes in the Mississippi Delta can't be handled that way, said Ralph Portier, a professor of environmental sciences at Louisiana State University.

Along the Louisiana and Mississippi coast, "you're talking about a sea of grass, if you will," similar to the Florida Everglades, Portier said. "When it gets oiled, if you try and remove some of this stuff, you're going to do more damage than good.

"In Gulf Shores, Alabama, and Destin, Florida, you can do that, but not here in what we like to call the Redneck Riviera," the southern Louisiana native said.

iReport: Watch BP workers gear up for spill duty

Tides, wind and rain will drive the oil deeper into the marsh, down into the vegetative mat, making it impossible for humans to go in and clean manually, he said. But once the flow of oil is stopped -- and no one knows when that will be -- scientists will spread fertilizer to boost several species of microscopic plants that degrade hydrocarbons such as oil.

In areas of especially heavy oiling, millions more of these microbes, grown in laboratories, could be brought in as reinforcements, Portier said. In warm spring and summer weather, the light, sweet crude "will degrade in weeks to months," he said.

Asphalt-like balls of petroleum embedded in the marshes "will be a little more complicated," he said.

"The microbial community will have to bite off little pieces and degrade them a bit at a time," he said.

There is no environmental concern with the technique because the microbes are not toxic and are native to the area, with different species thriving in fresh, brackish and salt water, Portier added.

"The question is what that long time frame will do to those plant species and what that will mean for habitat for seafood and migratory birds," he said. "Picture if the Everglades were being oiled, what a national tragedy that would be. And this area is even more fragile and productive."

The Gulf Coast is home to vast numbers of birds, animals and fish that need to be protected, said Tom MacKenzie of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

Endangered sea turtles are due to come in to shore soon and lay eggs in the coastal sand.

"A whole generation could be affected," MacKenzie said.

Floating booms to block oil from coming in cannot protect the entire coast, he said, so crews are prioritizing sensitive wildlife areas, including nesting grounds for pelicans and butterfly migration areas.

"This has the potential to be truly devastating," he said.

iReport: Watch booms being set up in Bay St. Louis, Mississippi

The oil spill response team has recovered 23,968 barrels (1,006,656 gallons) of an oil-water mix, according to the Deepwater Horizon Joint Information Center. Nearly 70 boats, including skimmers, tugs, barges and recovery vessels, are being used to deploy booms and chemical dispersant, which makes the oil evaporate more readily.

Another powerful tool being used to fight the oil slick is the Mississippi River itself, Portier said.

Engineers opened floodgates on Friday to divert Mississippi water through parts of the marshlands. The force of the river water flowing toward the Gulf will help push back against the oily seawater, and later it will help flush the contamination out of the grasslands, he said.

The damage to the crawfish, shrimp and oyster populations -- and the economy that relies on them -- could be severe, Portier said. Scientists can help rebuild the aquatic species, but many businesses could be ruined by then, he said.

"This whole economic fabric could be ripped, and that in turn will affect the cultural fabric" of the Delta region, he said. Still, Portier remains optimistic.

"All of us Cajuns are tragically hopeful," he said. "My ancestors -- if you can survive yellow fever and all the other things that happened growing up in the swamps and bayous of southern Louisiana, you'd better have a smile on your face, because that's about all you have some days."

Source : CNN

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As oil spill nears Gulf Coast, experts issue dire warnings

Venice, Louisiana (News Terupdate) - Gulf coast residents braced Saturday for the arrival of a massive oil slick creeping toward shore as nearly a million feet of boom were deployed in an effort to protect precious estuaries and wildlife -- even as thousands of barrels of crude continued gushing into the water.

Landfall along the Mississippi River Delta and other Gulf areas was expected as early as Saturday.

"I'm pretty much on pause right now ... it's just a big waiting game," said David Boola, a fisherman who leads boat trips for tourists out of Venice, Louisiana.

But even as officials and residents wait for the oil to reach land, the slick has already taken a dramatic toll on life all along the Gulf Coast, bringing fishing and tourism to a halt in many places and threatening to cripple those industries for weeks to come.

"I'm extremely worried because I have customers that [have] already canceled trips," Boola told CNN Saturday. "I should be out taking people fishing today and I'm not. I'm not making money today. Or tomorrow. I'm worried about the now factor, you know?"

Government leaders echoed those fears.

"The oil that is leaking offshore, the oil that is coming onto our coast threatens more than just our wildlife, our fisheries, our coast," Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal said at a Saturday press conference. "This oil literally threatens our way of life."

The oil company BP -- which operated the rig whose sinking caused the underwater oil gusher -- partnered with government officials to hold town hall meetings throughout the region Saturday to respond to concern about the spill's consequences.

But frustration was growing Saturday in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida. At a town hall meeting in Bayou La Batre, Alabama, Mayor Stan Wright warned fishermen in the audience that outbursts would be met with arrest. The fishermen were told that they were not allowed to ask questions.

Jindal suggested the response to the oil slick has so far been inadequate, saying "we continue to be concerned with BP's ability to respond to this incident."

Jindal said he has been working with local officials to develop cleanup contingency plans, but needs funding approval from BP and authorization from the U.S. Coast Guard's incident commander to move forward.

"We need to empower our locals on the ground," he said.

"Now they're saying we are seeing sheens," hitting the coast, Jindal said Saturday, citing the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. "But they expect the heavier oil to be coming by tomorrow and Monday."

U.S. Coast Guard Commandant Admiral Thad Allen -- who the Obama administration designated Saturday to lead response to the oil slick -- said that oil is likely to reach shorelines in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama.

"The real question is when," he said.

Allen said Saturday that the government and BP's top priority is trying to stop the oil leak, but offered no timetable for when that goal might be achieved.

"We don't know how many days the discharge will continue to occur," he said.

Such reports darkened forecasts about the spill's environmental impact.

"This has the potential of being truly devastating," Tom McKenzie, of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, told CNN.

Environmentalist Richard Charter of the Defenders of Wildlife organization said the magnitude of the oil leak could cause damage that would last decades.

"This event is a self-feeding fire," Charter told CNN. "It is so big and expanding so fast that it's pretty much beyond human response that can be effective. ... You're looking at a long-term poisoning of the area. Ultimately, this will have a multi-decade impact."

President Obama announced he will visit the oil spill area Sunday morning.

The oil spill started April 20, after an explosion on the BP-operated Deepwater Horizon drilling platform in the Gulf of Mexico. Eleven oil rig workers remain missing and are presumed dead.

The rig sank April 22 about 50 miles (80 km) off the southeast coast of Louisiana, and the untapped wellhead is gushing about 5,000 barrels of oil a day into the Gulf of Mexico, according to BP and government estimates. Some environmentalists say the amount could be much larger.

About 1.6 million gallons of oil have spilled since the explosion, the Coast Guard said.

BP said two Louisiana communities -- Venice and Port Fourchon -- will be the first places likely hit by the oil slick.

Nearly 2,000 personnel have joined the response effort, which includes 68 vessels, among them skimmers, tugs, barges and oil-recovery ships, officials said.

Crews worked through Friday night to dispense 3,000 gallons of sub-surface dispersant, officials said. The Coast Guard's Allen said that an initial test of dispersant released near the wellhead suggested the method could "significantly mitigate the amount [of oil] that makes it to the surface."

Such tests have never been done before, BP spokeswoman Marti Powers said. She said that the dispersants attach themselves to underwater concentrations of oil, causing the oil to sink to the bottom and dissipate.

While the dispersants can help dissipate oil slicks and help birds and other land-based or water-surface wildlife, the chemicals can hurt fish and other underwater species, environmentalist Charter said.

"The scale of the event and the likely duration of the event ... really leaves responders with no good options," Charter said. "While [dispersants] can protect terrestial wildlife ... out in the ocean they make toxic biocomponents available to the marine food chain."

Rapid response teams are staged to deploy to shorelines affected by the oil, federal officials said Saturday. The teams will evaluate and determine an appropriate clean-up effort to minimize impact on the environment.

In addition, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has approved Jindal's request to mobilize 6,000 National Guard troops.

Meanwhile, the Minerals Management Service has been in contact with all oil and gas operators in the oil spill area, officials said. Two platforms have stopped production and one has been evacuated as a safety measure, federal officials said in a release Saturday morning.

Federal officials have urged BP to beef up its response.

"We'll continue to urge BP to leverage additional assets," Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano said Friday as she toured the area. "It is time for BP to supplement their current mobilization as the slick of oil moves toward shore."

Doug Suttles, chief operating officer of BP, said the company has had three priorities: stop the flow of oil, minimize its impact and keep the public informed.

"We've so far mounted the largest response effort ever done in the world," Suttles said. "We've utilized every technology available, we've applied every resource request. ... We welcome every new idea and every offer of support."

BP said it has been trying to stop the flow by using remote-controlled submarines to activate a valve atop the well. But the valve is not working, the energy company said.

As concerns about the spill's toll mount -- particularly in the commercial fishing industry, a critical $2.4 billion economic engine for the region -- Obama promised steps to prevent a similar disaster in the future.

The president asked Interior Secretary Ken Salazar "to conduct a thorough review of this incident and report back to me in 30 days on what, if any, additional precautions and technologies should be required to prevent accidents like this from happening again."

Federal officials, including the president, emphasized that BP is legally responsible for paying the costs of the response to and cleanup of the spill.

The cause of the blast on the Deepwater Horizon remains unknown.

Seventeen of the 126 people on the rig were injured in the blast, three of them critically. One person remained hospitalized Saturday, federal officials said.

The House Energy and Commerce Committee is investigating.

Source : CNN

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Political fallout for Obama amid oil spill disaster?

Washington (News Terupdate) - As the oil slick from the recent offshore oil rig disaster makes its way to Gulf Coast shores -- expected to devastate the precious ecosystem and hurt struggling businesses -- the seeds of political fallout for the Obama administration are beginning to sprout.

Conservative radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh said on his program that the oil slick disaster is "Obama's Katrina."

Not so, says Media Matters for America:

"Media conservatives have rushed to absurdly compare the Obama administration's response to a catastrophic oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico to the Bush Administration's botched response after Hurricane Katrina, a hurricane that left more than 1,500 dead," the liberal-leaning group said on its website. "This claim is undermined by a number of facts."

Another Obama critic, Joe Weisenthal of BusinessInsider.com, wrote Thursday, "Today the story got elevated to national emergency level, but the explosion on the rig happened eight days ago!"

White House Senior Adviser David Axelrod told ABC news Friday: "This is always the case in Washington -- that whenever something like this happens, the political speculation sets in."

"The truth of the matter is we had the Coast Guard on the scene almost immediately after this accident. The deputy secretary of the interior was on the ground the next day, and we've been coordinating closely with the local authorities and [BP officials] from the very beginning."

Axelrod said that no additional offshore oil drilling has been authorized and "none will until we find out what happened here and whether there was something unique and preventable here."

On April 20, the Deepwater Horizon rig was ripped by an explosion that burned for two days until the rig sank. Eleven missing men are presumed dead.

State and local officials are now scrambling to avert further natural disaster, which is threatening to surpass the Exxon Valdez disaster 20 years ago in Alaska. In addition, several governmental agencies -- along with the U.S. military -- are aiding the effort.

Several top administration figures were also sent to the region Friday.

Speaking at the White House Friday, Obama emphasized that BP -- the company that owns the rig -- is legally responsible for paying the costs of the response to and cleanup of the spill. Still, he said, "We are fully prepared to meet our responsibilities to any and all affected communities."

In early April, Obama announced plans to pursue the expansion of oil drilling off the nation's coasts, a plan that received praise by Republicans and other administration critics.

Noting that it was not an easy decision to make, Obama said that in order to sustain economic growth, produce jobs and keep businesses competitive, "we're going to need to harness traditional sources of fuel even as we ramp up production of new sources of renewable, homegrown energy."

Some Democrats and environmentalists ripped into Obama's decision at the time.

Now, with the oil leaking at a high rate, Obama's critics are once again calling on him to kill offshore drilling.

Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Florida, asked Obama in a letter Thursday to halt exploratory oil operations in coastal waters.

Nelson said in the letter that the potential environmental and economic damage from the current spill required immediate preventive actions until the cause is discovered -- adding that "until we learn what happened, I'm asking that you also call for an immediate halt of test wells and all other exploratory operations in coastal waters."

Nelson also said he would file legislation "that would, for the time being, prohibit the Interior Department from acting on your administration's plans to expand offshore drilling, including seismic testing and other exploratory operations."

On Friday, Obama told reporters in the White House Rose Garden that domestic oil production continues to be "an important part of our overall strategy" but said "it must be done responsibly for the safety of our workers and our environment."

Obama also ordered Interior Secretary Ken Salazar to "report back to me in 30 days" on any "precautions in technologies" needed to prevent such accidents in the future.

"We're going to make sure that any leases going forward have those safeguards," Obama said. "We've also dispatched teams to the Gulf Coast to inspect all deep-water rigs and platforms to address safety concerns."

The oil slick disaster could also stall a climate change bill from moving forward.

The House passed its version last year. The Senate's version was supposed to be introduced this week -- but was derailed by Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham, a key sponsor of the bill, pulling his support.

The proposed Senate bill included provisions for offshore drilling -- something sponsors hoped would bring enough Republicans on board to support the bill.

Political observers say Democrats will likely have a hard time supporting a bill with offshore drilling components in it. Those who represent states with coastlines will undoubtedly face pressure coming from constituents as the midterm election nears.

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Gulf Coast braces for an oily mess

(News Terupdate) - The Gulf Coast braced for a greasy and unwelcome tide Thursday as the region's largest oil spill in decades threatened the marshlands and beaches at the mouth of the Mississippi River.

"This Saturday is the first date we can go catch live bait," said Glenn Sanchez, who runs a marina in Hopedale, Louisiana. "If this was to happen, this could just devastate the whole of Louisiana."

Hopedale is in what Sanchez calls the "big toe" of Louisiana, about 35 miles southeast of New Orleans.

It's where dry land gives way to a patchwork of marshes, lagoons and canals that drain into Chandeleur Sound and the Gulf of Mexico. The estuaries are rich in crab, oysters and shrimp, and Breton Sound Marina is home to a variety of commercial and sport-fishing vessels that buy bait from Sanchez.

But the spill that began last week when the Deepwater Horizon drill rig blew up and sank has cast a new shadow on a region already under heavy environmental pressure.

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The rig sat atop an oil well that is now spewing up to 210,000 gallons of light sweet crude a day into the Gulf of Mexico. BP, the well's owner, has been trying to shut off the flow using eight remote-controlled submarines. It's had no success up to this point.

iReport: BP stages Alabama coast

George Crozier, administrator of Alabama's Dauphin Island Sea Lab, said the worst of the spill appeared most likely to hit Chandeleur Sound and western Mississippi Sound, to the north. The barrier islands that shielded those waters were devastated by Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and have yet to bounce back, he said.

But weather patterns and the amount of oil released make it difficult to predict where the slick will wash ashore.

"It's just too early to have much sense of what's going to happen," Crozier said.

The Coast Guard has begun attempting to burn the oil off in sections, but the rainbow sheen on the surface now stretches for about 100 miles and was less than 20 miles off the mouth of the Mississippi River late Wednesday.

"This is very frightening to us, because we don't know what the impact is," said Frankie Duggan, port director for Biloxi, Mississippi.

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Louisiana is the No. 1 producer of shrimp and oysters in the United States, while fishing remains a major industry on the Mississippi coast even after casino gambling has come to dominate the local economy. The smell of heavy oil already was wafting ashore Tuesday, said Barry Deshamp, a charter boat skipper in Long Beach, Mississippi.

Deshamp's business is ramping up ahead of the summer, and while no one has canceled trips yet, "Nobody wants to fish in an oil slick," he said.

The 120-mile oil slick advanced to within a few miles of the mouth of the Mississippi River on Thursday -- well within the 10- to 20-mile range Deshamp usually fishes. The bigger commercial boats "can pretty much go around it," but the slick is drifting over prime fishing grounds for popular catches, such as red snapper.

"It's unreal they haven't even stopped it yet," Deshamp said. "At first they were telling us it's not even leaking."

Worse yet, the spill is happening at a time when Gulf shrimp are in their spawning season. That puts more pressure on fishermen already feeling the pinch from high fuel prices, increased imports and a late spring, said Scott St. Pierre, captain of the shrimp boat "Mom and Dad" out of Port Fourchon, Louisiana.

"This is our critical time. We want our babies to grow. We need south wind and warm weather," St. Pierre said. "If the south wind brings them oil, we thought we had problems before? This has the potential to be a disaster."

The first of the oil slick could hit southeastern Louisiana's shores late Friday, Gov. Bobby Jindal said. The area is home to several wildlife reserves, and the state might even put prison inmates into the effort by using them to clean oil from birds, Jindal said.

The Gulf Coast hasn't seen a major oil spill in about 40 years, Crozier said. Most of the toxic components in the crude spill are likely to evaporate in the sun, but a "physical mess" is likely to remain in the marshes.

"The occasional drum has fallen overboard, but we've never had anything of this magnitude," he said.

Wilma Subra, a chemist who advises the Louisiana Environmental Action Network, said hundreds of spotters are watching for signs of the slick along the shoreline. But until the damaged well is capped, the coast could be hit over and over again when weather patterns shift.

Subra expressed hope the planned burning would limit the slick's advance, "but it all depends on how the weather moves."

"This is just going to be unbelievable," Subra said. "It's not going to be just a one-time event."

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Coast Guard considers burning Gulf oil slick to save coastline

(News Terupdate) - The U.S. Coast Guard could begin burning off portions of a Gulf of Mexico oil slick as early as Wednesday, as the pool of crude began to encroach on sensitive ecological areas in the Mississippi River Delta.

The option is one of several that Coast Guard officials were considering as the oil slick moved to within 20 miles of the Louisiana coastline.

Officials say the oil spill has the potential to become one of the worst in U.S. history.

Oil is still leaking at a rate of about 42,000 gallons a day from the well, located some 50 miles off the coast of Louisiana. A drilling rig, the Deepwater Horizon, exploded and sank at the site last week.

BP, the well's owner, has been trying to shut off the well using eight remote-controlled submarines, but has had no luck up to this point.

"If we don't secure the well, this could be one of the most serious oil spills in U.S. history," Coast Guard Rear Admiral Mary Landry, head of a joint response task force, said at a press conference Tuesday afternoon.

The Coast Guard stressed it would never set the entire spill on fire at once. It would instead use a 500-foot-long, flame-retardant boom to gather some of the oil and then burn only the crude inside its perimeter, according to spokeswoman Lt. Sue Kerver.

Twenty miles is the closest the slick has come to land so far.

Officials said oil slicks are sometimes set on fire, especially when they are near sensitive marsh areas where heavy equipment used to clean the spill may cause more harm than good.

The spill, measured from end to end, stretched as wide as 42 miles by 80 miles, although oil isn't necessarily covering that entire area.

Most of the slick is a thin sheen on the water's surface, ranging in thickness from a couple of molecules to the equivalent of a layer of paint. About 3 percent of it is a heavy, pudding-like crude oil.

At its current flow rate, it would take over 260 days to rival the Exxon Valdez disaster, which discharged some 11 million gallons into Alaska's Price William Sound. Still, even if it never compares in size to the Exxon Valdez spill, if it makes landfall it could have serious ecological repercussions.

The Coast Guard, BP and the rig's owner Transocean have deployed nearly 50 vessels to help contain and clean the slick.

Marine life has been spotted in the area. Over the weekend, a plane from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service sighted five small whales nearby.

Efforts are also underway near the shoreline to deal with the spill should it reach land, including positioning boom material around sensitive ecological areas.

Five staging areas have been set up on land, stretching from Venice, Louisiana, to Pensacola, Florida.

Landry said it appears the slick should remain at sea for at least the next three days, although weather reports for the latter part of that period suggest the wind could shift and blow the slick toward land.

The oil, if it stays at sea, will eventually evaporate, break down and sink, or get cleaned up, but analysts have said the spill could have political fallout, especially if it reaches shore.

Several lawmakers and interest groups have led a charge over the last several years to open up more parts of the U.S. coast for oil drilling, efforts that are generally supported by the public.

That support could erode if crude oil starts washing up on the Louisiana or Mississippi coasts.

The well is expected to continue leaking until it is sealed. The leak appears to be coming from a pipe that ran from the well head to the drilling rig, which is now laying upside down in 5,000 feet of water.

It has not been decided if the rig will be salvaged or remain where it is, a Transocean official said Monday.

To seal the leak, three approaches are being tried.

BP is now using a set of remote controlled submarines in an attempt to activate the well's "blow out preventer" -- a steel device the size of a small house that sits atop the well and is intended to choke off the flow of oil in the event of a disaster. It's not clear why that device didn't not originally act to cap the well, or if it will be of any use in the future.

BP is also bringing in another drilling rig which could seal the well, but that effort would take months, according to a BP spokesman.

In the meantime, the company is also trying a novel approach to capture the oil -- using a dome right above the well head. The dome resembles an inverted funnel, with a pipe leading up to ships waiting at the surface to capture the oil. That tactic has never been tried in deep water before.

A BP spokesman said the dome should be ready in two to four weeks.

Eleven workers are still missing after last week's explosion. The search for them was suspended last Friday.

Another 115 other people were rescued from the rig after it exploded. One person injured in the blast remains hospitalized. The cause of the blast remains under investigation.

Source : CNN

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