"The worst oil spill is US history" . . . . or . . . . "The worst made made disaster ever?"

[Stinky The Clown]

I think we've crossed from the first case to the second.

Oil flows, essentially unabated, at a rate that, on the low side, is 10 gallons per second. (Do the math based on the commonly accepted 19,000 bbls/day).

The Gulf estuarys at the mouth of the Mississippi are essentially dead.

The surface spill is caught up in the Loop Current and can conceivably make its way to Europe .... and then what?

The undersea plumes appear to be even bigger.

Dispersants are doing who knows what to who knows who.

No one has a clue how to stop this. The best hope is for a solution that is two months away.

10 gallons a *second*.

Minimum.

[blindpig]

1. Yes, it is.

The very worst.

Kill Capitalism

[NNN0LHI]

2. Stinky, before your editing time runs out change that first 'made" in the subject line to 'man'

I do the same thing all the time.

We are getting old.

Don

[BrentWil]

3. List of largest Oil Spills... Interesting

According to Wiki... this is either number 3 or last on the list. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_spill#Largest_oil_spills

[maryf]

4. I cannot believe they are doing all they can...

its the profit loss they are concerned with, or the lack of profit making opportunities...that's the bottom line...these people would live in bunkers the rest of their lives if it meant the money would keep rolling in...
Capitalism is the root cause, the money mongers care not...Capitalism is a killer, killers of this magnitude deserve the death sentence...

[whattheidonot]

6. all they got.

At this point it is all they have. No forethought went into this. The estimates of the oil coming out are not close. no where near. BP would not spend a million a day for 120,000 gallons of oil.

[WeDidIt]

5. Nowhere near the worst man made disaster yet.

Chernobyl is number one and we're nowhere near it. The gusher would have to keep gushing for at least another year before we approach the disaster levels that was Chernobyl.

Hell, we're not even close to this man made disaster yet:

[lonestarnot]

7. You mean we're not not #1! Damn.

[Posteritatis]

8. Ixtoc 1. The Gulf War spill. Chernobyl. This is bad but nowhere near those. (nt)

[WeDidIt]

9. I will grant it will most likely surpass Ixtoc 1

but I doubt it will surpass the Gulf War spill.

And it gets nowhere near Chernobyl.

[TheWebHead]

10. well, oil isn't "man made"

and there is some hypocrisy for we as Americans to be bashing oil companies/states when we consume nearly a quarter of what they produce. this wouldn't have happened if we emulated Canada and required relief wells to drill. Oil companies argue against it and won't do it unless mandated to, they rely on regulation to ensure even playing fields, and in this case it saves them from themselves. The same argument could've been made about how we should have had our big banks emulate Canada w/ capital requirements and how are home mortgage system should emulate our neighbors to the north, where you can't walk away from a loan in a heads I win with capital gains, tails the banks lose offloading my capital loss scenario.