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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsBayou Frack-Out: The Massive Oil and Gas Disaster You’ve Never Heard Of
By Mike Ludwig, Truthout | Report
For residents in Assumption Parish, the boiling, gas-belching bayou, with its expanding toxic sinkhole and quaking earth is no longer a mystery; but there is little comfort in knowing the source of the little-known event that has forced them out of their homes.
Located about 45 miles south of Baton Rouge, Assumption Parish carries all the charms and curses of southern Louisiana. Networks of bayous, dotted with trees heavy with Spanish moss, connect with the Mississippi River as it slowly ambles toward the Gulf of Mexico. Fishermen and farmers make their homes there, and so does the oil and gas industry, which has woven its own network of wells, pipelines and processing facilities across the lowland landscape.
The first sign of the oncoming disaster was the mysterious appearance of bubbles in the bayous in the spring of 2012. For months the residents of a rural community in Assumption Parish wondered why the waters seemed to be boiling in certain spots as they navigated the bayous in their fishing boats.
Then came the earthquakes. The quakes were relatively small, but some residents reported that their houses shifted in position, and the tremors shook a community already desperate for answers. State officials launched an investigation into the earthquakes and bubbling bayous in response to public outcry, but the officials figured the bubbles were caused by a single source of natural gas, such as a pipeline leak. They were wrong.
On a summer night in early August, the earth below the Bayou Corne, located near a small residential community in Assumption, simply opened up and gave way. Several acres of swamp forest were swallowed up and replaced with a gaping sinkhole that filled itself with water, underground brines, oil and natural gas from deep below the surface. Since then, the massive sinkhole at Bayou Corne has grown to 8 acres in size.
http://earthfirstnews.wordpress.com/2012/12/06/bayou-frack-out-the-massive-oil-and-gas-disaster-youve-never-heard-of/
Indi Guy
(3,992 posts)Selatius
(20,441 posts)These are working class people. They haven't the political capital nor the legal resources to wage a years-long battle in the courts against a corporate adversary.
Indi Guy
(3,992 posts)That's how big oil, coal & gas have rolled for decades. They never crap where they eat -- only where someone else does.
RobertEarl
(13,685 posts)The reason the sinkhole formed is there is a salt dome underground.
Men made many big holes in that salt dome using water to dissolve the salt. Now they store oil and gas in those holes.
What happened was, in one of those holes, the side collapsed and the surface soil sank into it, creating this sinkhole. Now water is eating away at the salt dome and it will dissolve, leaving a gaping 10,000 foot deep hole.
This link will take you to a local area website. Be sure to look over the Gallery. There are some technical drawings there from which you can tell the salt dome is being eaten away. My bet is the Ole Mississippi is headed that way.
http://bayoucornesinkhole.weebly.com/index.html
Indi Guy
(3,992 posts)(from a different site)
RobertEarl
(13,685 posts)To scale it you must remember that the top is 1 mile times 3 mile wide. And at least two miles high.
Now just imagine what will happen when all that salt dissolves = big ass hole in the ground.
Indi Guy
(3,992 posts)pugetres
(507 posts)The article presented a good synopsis of what has and what continues to occur in Bayou Corne. The article did not mention that twice during the past two weeks, deadly hydrogen sulfide has also been detected. The locals want federal assistance but have been stymied by the state. This disaster has been ongoing and growing day by day.
Edited to add a link: http://theadvocate.com/home/4628972-125/officials-seek-gas-source
HarveyDarkey
(9,077 posts)And welcome to DU
pugetres
(507 posts)There is another online forum that has been discussing this since the bubbling was first noticed. That forum does have Assumption Parrish residents who keep us abreast of the local happening.
Thanks for the welcome!
CrispyQ
(36,518 posts)Humans.
xchrom
(108,903 posts)arthritisR_US
(7,292 posts)I think that was a major failure on his part