William Rivers Pitt: Top Kill Indeed

[babylonsister]

http://www.truthout.org/top-kill-indeed59946

Top Kill Indeed

Saturday 29 May 2010

by: William Rivers Pitt, t r u t h o u t | Op-Ed


"Top kill." That has been the phrase on the lips of every network news talking head, and in the lead paragraph of every news report, all throughout this last week. British Petroleum (BP) describes the process this way: "The primary objective of the top kill process is to put heavy kill mud into the well so that it reduces the pressure and then the flow from the well. Once the kill mud is in the well and it's shut down, then we follow up with cement to plug the leak."

Think about that for a second. Here was the Deepwater Horizon, an absolute marvel of high-flying engineering and construction, until it exploded and collapsed into the sea. Afterward, here was this hole in the ocean spewing raw crude into the fertile waters of the Gulf. Despite all the fantastic technological prowess evidenced in the construction of the Deepwater Horizon, it's failure left us so buggered for answers to the oil vomiting from the hole they drilled that they are down to stuffing mud into it and praying that works.

Maybe it has, actually. Friday's New York Times suggested as much, reporting, "By injecting solid objects overnight as well as heavy drilling fluid into the stricken well leaking oil into the Gulf of Mexico, engineers appeared to have stemmed the flow of oil." However, the report goes on to state that we won't really know if it worked for another day or so, and even if it did work, the leak could start up again without warning.

Let's all take a huge, arm-flapping leap of faith for a moment and assume the "top kill" mud bomb did in fact work, and the oil from the Deepwater Horizon disaster has actually been stopped. A lot of people will probably do some victory dancing on your television screen - BP officials, Coast Guard officials and maybe even the president - and if they do, it is your moral obligation to scream at them until you feel like your throat could burst.

This is just beginning, and even with the oil spigot turned off (for now), it is going to get much, much worse, and will stay that way for a very long time.

snip//

So, let's be clear. There are millions of gallons of oil threatening thousands of miles of coastlines, ecosystems and livelihoods. Nobody knows how much there is, or where it will appear, or when. It's about to be brutally hot exactly where the clean-up needs to happen, and a whole slew of hurricanes and tropical storms are on the way.

And our best response is to fill a hole with mud, just like the little Dutch boy facing 11 holes in the dike with only ten fingers on his hands. All of this because we are so addicted to oil that the petroleum companies like BP were allowed to "regulate" themselves.

Top kill indeed.

[flyarm]

1. many of our throats were already bursting with the horrible air we were forced to breathe because

of these bastards! And the cover up of it ..of course!

[Warren Stupidity]

2. 50 million barrels estimated if not plugged.

That is 2,100,000,000 gallons of crude oil that will empty into the gulf. BP admitted today that the top kill, junk kill bullshit has failed. They are now going to try another concrete dome, like their first attempt. At this point it is clear that there is no good technology to deal with well failures at 5,000 feet underwater, that GOVERNMENT should never have allowed drilling operations without the requisite technology to handle failures of this sort, and that more importantly MARKET FORCES i.e. GREED are ONE FUCKING POOR REGULATOR of human endeavors that can have massive consequences.

[glitch]

5. "GREED IS ONE FUCKING POOR REGULATOR"

Says everything (criminal shame that it needs saying at all).

[Hydra]

6. +1000

Deserves an OP of itself.

[hlthe2b]

3. Yet another good piece...

I appreciate his latest contribution to the discussion

[oldtime dfl_er]

4. Recommended

I'm already wondering what BP is going to change their name to after this.