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Dr. Erica Miller, with Tri-State Bird Rescue and Research, giving a dose of Pepto Bismal to a Northern Gannet bird at a facility in Fort Jackson, La. on Friday, Apr 30, 2010. Normally white when full grown, this one is covered in oil from the massive oil slick in the Gulf of Mexico that washed ashore in Louisiana late Thursday. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Yes, that's correct...a device that costs one half million dollars may have prevented what is on track to become the worst oil spill in U.S. history.
The device is called an acoustic trigger (aka. acoustic switch, actuator). It is a remote-controlled device deployed off oil rigs that sends acoustic impulses through the water, triggering an underwater valve or explosives to shut down the well even if the rig is catastrophically damaged or abandoned.
All offshore rigs have one main switch to shut off the flow of oil by closing a valve located on the ocean floor. There is also supposed to be a backup called a “dead man,” that will shut down the well in the event of a catastrophe on the rig.
Apparently neither of these devices worked on the Deepwater Horizon rig operated by British Petroleum (BP). The crew members who would have been closest to the shutoff switch are among those missing and presumed dead. If the rig was equipped with an acoustic trigger, it would have been a last resort option and could have been activated from a remote location.
According to the Wall Street Journal, Norway and Brazil require these devices in all offshore drilling operations. While they are not required with rigs offshore the U.K., BP elects to deploy them there. BP chose not to equip oil rigs off the coast of the U.S. with acoustic triggers because U.S. regulations enacted in 2003 do not require companies to do so.
CBS reported that Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL) sent President Obama a letter Thursday reminding him that in 2000 the Interior Department insisted "oil companies have 'reliable backup systems' in the event of a rig blowout." By 2003, the plan was scrapped after a closed-door meeting with energy company executives conducted by then-Vice President Dick Cheney. "This could be one of the world's greatest nightmare scenarios of an oil gusher," Nelson said.
A Pensacola attorney, Mike Papantonio, whose firm filed a class-action lawsuit three days ago against BP on behalf of Gulf fishermen had this to say on MSNBC's The Ed show:
BP didn't want to spend the money for a system - a fail safe system, used all over the world...[that could have prevented this]. We're talking about a company that makes forty billion a year that wouldn't invest five hundred thousand dollars...It is the most unreported part of this story...
View the full interview here: (Papantonio appears about 3 minutes into the video clip).
While the environmental, economic, social and political consequences of this catastrophe are certainly significant, and certain to impact the state of Florida, the story here is the story behind the story. One can get the news about the extent of the spill, cleanup efforts, the impact on wildlife, industries, etc. from any news outlet. What you won't hear, the story behind the story, is the fact that deregulation of the oil industry in 2003 enabled BP, which posts about $40 billion a year in profits, to cut costs and maximize profit by failing to utilize a $500,000 device that may have prevented this disaster.
Now that you've lost a $560,000 oil rig, are spending $6 million a day in cleanup efforts, have lost billions in the drop of your stock on the NYSE, have infuriated the citizens of four gulf coast states...how's that business model working out for you, BP?
Comments
For all you Republitards out there where math passes you by (along with logic and reality), that equates to $1 per every $80,000. So if you made $80k per year, and someone told you that you had to pay $1 of insurance to avoid a disaster, and you said you could not afford it, wouldn't you feel like a dishonest, lying piece of poop?
Anyone who ever uttered the words, "Drill, Baby Drill" ought to report to Louisiana coast for cleanup duty.
yet another reason that the whole Bush admin. was a bunch of idiots that couldn't tell their butt from a hole in the ground! I have said it before and will say it again, the only thing he did that was in a sound mind his whole time in office was ducking the shoes that were thrown at him. Bruce, since when does Republicans and honesty go hand in hand?
By the way, I am convinced that we did have weapons of mass destruction, it is called the Republicans! See Bush was right all along! WE D0 WE DO, and Bush was their leader!
Sarah Palin, so tell me, "How's your drill baby drill workin for you now?" Dumb Twitter!
I say ban the oil industry and let's head toward a safer, more economical fuel source..water, wind, spit...anything other than oil. Let's leave the middle earth alone and let it mend itself. It's time for all of us to demand better cars that run off resources that are safe, economical and efficient...and will never ever, ever, do what the oil industry is doing to the earth, life, and the future of all our grand kids! Stop the oil industry now! Park your car and demand that as American Citizens we are offered better transportation that is safe, economical, and environmentally sound. Contact your senators now.
Do you own/drive a car?
Acoustic switch works in combination with BOP (Blow Out Preventer). Acoustic switch is just another way of activating BOP. Submersible vehicles reached BOP and can't get it to work.
Acoustic switch wouldn't have made it work, either. The BOP isn't operating for some reason. It has multiple valves, any one of which would stop the oil but none are working.
"BP chose not to equip oil rigs off the coast of the U.S. with acoustic triggers because U.S. regulations enacted in 2003 do not require companies to do so" If I was an exec for BP, I wouldn't be able to install these systems fast enough. It would save billions of dollars & shore life that may never return. Obama has had 9 days. He could have picked up the phone on April 24th & started the ball rolling.
Anyone that has ever said "drill baby drill" should report to the gulf coast for clean-up duty! Bring your own sponges!
Cheney's Oil Spill
Dick Cheney . . . the gift that just keeps on giving.
Well, Louisiana voted for Bush back in 2000. So did Alabama. And so did Mississippi.
Pay back is now a bitch, isn't it?
Why was 0bamo slow to respond? Does he even care?
Perhaps it really was sunk by a North Korean torpedo?
Oil rig in the Gulf sunk by a North Korean torpedo
http: // www.examiner.com/examiner/x-41853-Homeland-Security-Examiner~y2010m5d3-Oil-rig-in-the-Gulf-sunk-by-a-North-Korean-Torpedo
When will you people learn that we must drill? If you know anything about the Oil business you would know this article is total propaganda.
First off, the North Korea claim originated with Sorcha Faal, a known disinformationalist. Second, BP/Transoceanic/Halliburton are looking at the most expensive accident in history, with billions of dollars in lawsuits already being filed by residents of the gulf coast states. The oil disaster, coming just weeks after Obama approved new coastal drilling, is a major political embarrassment heading into an election season. The US Government as a whole is looking incompetent with what appears as the latest in a long line of infrastructure failures brought on by neglect. Both the oil companies and the US Government are off the hook if the public can be tricked into believing this disaster was a terrorist attack. Official US economic policy has been to protect corporate profits while dropping the losses onto the people. Claiming a terrorist attack is the real culprit paves the way for the public to get stuck with the bill, and for the oil companies to get the lawsuits thrown out of court.
Southron and Kevin...Obama's response time means nothing in this. What would it have done if he were quicker...nothing? Besides, I thought Republicans and Corporations want government to stay out of their business... this disaster is their business. And SE-LA, we don't have to drill because let's just say screw the oil industry. Let's get moving on wind, solar, hydroelectric, tidal, geothermal, etc.
The thecnologies needed to replace combustion engines and everything else that reqiures oil have existed for most of my life. Big oil and other big business has kept these things from being put into practice for too long. WE DON'T EVEN NEED OIL. Personally I don't care who has to give up what to turn this around. NO TOXIC BUSINESSES! That would be a great political philosophy, oh except the corporations wouldn't give you all that wonderful,all mighty money. Your entire lifestyle and mine are the contrivences of people who believe they are more entitled than you. Better than you. Maybe it wasn't all a plan but it happened nevertheless. We don't live in any way as nature would have us do. It's impossible to drop off the grid and live on your own land. There are homeowners associations that won't let you hang out your laundry to dry because, "well we just don't think that way".It's ugly so you have to use a dryer, an artificial means to a simple end.
who said we must drill???? That is a completely insane statement and proof of the societal conditioning-read BRAINWASHING-that the lesser intelligent amoung us have become victim of. And again I have to ask, What abot the big empty???? I can't find anyone, not in the pocket of big oil, to say what these giant emty holes will do. One thing must not be forgotten. They do not play by any recognizable rules. They are liars and they will say anything, ANYTHING,to make themselves relevent and most of all necessary. If someone says "drill" I say, "Who pays you?"
In each day, we use an average of 3 gallons of crude oil per person.
The oil leakage could have been stopped within hours by placing a clean (!) electrically ignited multi-Megaton, aneutronic, high thermal plasma, fusion nuke (e.g. D+6Li, p+11B, etc.), just into the oil field. The heat would pyroloze (crack up) the whole oil-deposit into methane (CH4) that burned up into water and CO2 when reaching the atmosphere. Of course, this isn't a real option for BP (Beyond Pollution), since they want the money flowing out of the oil-field. And of course, it isn't a real option for the US government, since they had to disclose advanced military nuclear weapons technology. The good news are however, oil will be depleted within 25-35 years. Then humanity will extinct itself in cruel nuclear war for the remaining resources. So earth will get a pause for a couple of millions of years to regenerate itself. Maybe a future humanity V2.0 will do it better.
coal isnt so dirty after all
maybe this will learn the us to stop being so greedy. Stop offshore drilling, getoff dependancy for foreign oil and fix this.
Wrong they had a valve on it and even the ROV's could not close it. the only Difference between the BOP and the Acoustic Kill Switch is that one is actuated by sonar. The Blow out preventer and the acoustic kill switch close a vale and in this case it was the valve, not the instruction to close that failed.
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