Author Topic: Looming Catastrope  (Read 4216 times)

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Offline FourBee

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Looming Catastrope
« on: April 26, 2010, 06:43:15 PM »

The collapsed deepwater oil rig is leaking 42,000 gals of oil per day and the spill is heading for shore.  It already covers an approx. 40 square mile area.    If crews can't shut off the flow soon it may take several months.   Let's pray that this looming catastrophe is nipped in the bud.

 ps  4/29/2010: This mornings newpaper said the leak is closer to 275,000 gals per day, and will possibly start a burn-off today.
4/30/2010:  Head of Oil Slick has hit the Coasts of Louisana this morning.  Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal, whose state is still recovering from the ravages of Hurricane Katrina in 2005, declared a state of emergency and asked the Defense Department for funds to deploy up to 6,000 National Guard troops to help.
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Offline saddlebum

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #1 on: April 26, 2010, 07:06:41 PM »
MAN I HATE IT WHEN THAT HAPPENS!!!!  Seriously. I want to know why the blowout preventor didn't work. Even in an explosion it should have worked and stopped the flow of oil. This is really bad on alot of levels. The roughnecks that died and their families. Really bad for the enviroment and critters. Really good for liberal enviromentalist ammo against offshore drilling. I wish some one would use this for an arguement for more on-shore drilling for enviromental reasons. President "Enviro" just gave us permission to do some more offshore and now this happens. I hope his enviro. friends give him a real hard time about it!!!   Dang-it, I really hate oil spills!!!    >:(    :'(
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Offline magooch

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #2 on: April 27, 2010, 05:19:09 AM »
TM7, I think that must have been a "tongue-in-cheek" comment, but I'll take the bait anyway.

We all know that nuclear plants are not subject to a catastrope (sorry about that FourBee), but they most assuredly are potential catastrophes.  Having lived for years in the shadow of a now defunct nuclear plant, I know too well what can and sometimes does go wrong in these fascilities.  All the same, I support the use of nuclear power to generate the electrical requirements of this country.  We don't yet have any better alternatives.

Oil spills are a horrible thing and should be avoided at nearly any cost if possible, but as is the case with everything--if it can go bad, it will and at the worst time and place possible.  That's just the way things go.  We just have to deal with it and clean it up.  Hopefully the technology will evolve and these events will become even more rare.
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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #3 on: April 27, 2010, 06:42:31 AM »
We've been "Living the Light Fandango" under the Florida Flicker and Flash glow of nuclear power for decades.  The Hutchinson Island Nuclear Power Plant is one such plant that is operated by my older (and wiser) brother - the "Homer Simpson" of HI-NuPooPoo - or so we call him/it.  Nuclear power is "clean and cheap" respectively, in a State with no hydropower.  If it melts down here, we get glass to go with those tar balls.

Offline myronman3

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #4 on: April 27, 2010, 07:02:51 AM »
i'll take an oil spill over a nuclear meltdown like chernobyl anyday.   

  people say "there are safeguards"....and as we see here, everything is failable. 

Offline MGMorden

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #5 on: April 27, 2010, 07:38:53 AM »
i'll take an oil spill over a nuclear meltdown like chernobyl anyday.  

  people say "there are safeguards"....and as we see here, everything is failable.  


Indeed, but life is dangerous.  You drive a car everyday which can kill you.  You shoot guns all the time which just might have an incorrect powder charge or weakened steel.  You eat meat which just might be contaminated.

It's all about a risk to benefit assessment.  Nuclear power certainly CAN have accidents, but their likelyhood is greatly diminished but proper safeguards.  They provide a TON of cheap energy (energy that we are chewing through at record paces, and that rate will only go up) and produce waste that is of a very local concern only (ie, you're not polluting an entire city like a coal plant).  Breeder reactors can stretch that fuel even farther and ends up with waste of even less concern (the only reason it's banned in the US is that in the wrong hands, breeder reactors produce waste that can be used to more easily make a bomb).

You want a solution to the energy crisis that doesn't involve us all "going green" and forgoing all electricity (as if that's ever going to happen)?  Nuclear is going to be required.

If/when there is an accident, we'll deal with it, just like we deal with every other problem that results from living life outside of any non-existent "safe-zone".

Offline saddlebum

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #6 on: April 27, 2010, 10:41:48 AM »
Oh, if I only had a nuclear powered car or farm equipment or semi truck to bring me my groceries..... :'(
" FIREARMS STAND NEXT IN IMPORTANCE TO THE CONSTITUTION ITSELF. THEY ARE THE AMERICAN PEOPLE'S LIBERTY TEETH AND KEYSTONE UNDER INDEPENDENCE."       George Washington

“OUR CONSTITUTION WAS MADE ONLY FOR A MORAL AND RELIGIOUS PEOPLE. IT IS WHOLLY INADEQUATE TO THE GOVERNMENT OF ANY OTHER."           John Adams

Offline teamnelson

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #7 on: April 27, 2010, 12:40:26 PM »
The catastrophe of the spill itself will most likely be overshadowed by the political "ado" it will generate. Perhaps FEMA/DHS/ATF will rope off the coast and take control? The EPA will need new workers to scrub ducks and kiss fish; perhaps a national work force paying off their recently nationalized student loans? To say its a mess just doesn't quite grasp the situation. My prayers are up for the roughneck's families.

The Navy has/is using over 40 something nuke reactors, safely, and has produced a few thousand trained personnel who routinely build, maintain and operate said reactors on a daily basis. If you combine a "use less" cultural strategy, with a pro-nuke/wind/solar energy strategy, and biodiesel replacement for combustion engines, you promote a safe, renewable, sustainable model for the generations to come. The small high-yield reactors preferred by the Navy are also safely operating in China and France.

But it really does boil down to culture ... is America ready for "less"? Or are we merely the land based version of the people in Wall-E.
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Offline myronman3

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #8 on: April 27, 2010, 05:50:27 PM »
 sorry, i just cant get past the nuclear side of it.  the stuff scares me.    look what chernobyl did to the bread basket of europe.   it is now a wasteland.   
    i have heard it discussed that the word 'chernobyl' means "wormwood".  and, wormwood was supposed to poison 1/3 of the earths food and water, no?

Offline Oldshooter

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #9 on: April 27, 2010, 06:18:47 PM »
Oil spill my aching back!  Do any of you guys know how much oil was spilled during WW1 and WW2 in the Atlantic ocean alone? Oh and the oil spilled in Alaska after Valdez. Its a natural thing and mother nature cleans her own behind.

Here is some oil spills from recent years we survived those!

http://www.endgame.org/oilspills.htm


If ya wanna drive cars and trucks deal with it!  If you are too pollution sensitive move to Kalifornia, they dont drill there. OH and paddle your wooden boats out to the Gulf to help clean it up.

Really guys, Men died out there a little oil sheen wont kill nobody!  Dont let the media freak you out!  Pray for the men that died and their families. obama wont come down here to have a service for them I bet!
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Offline mirage1988

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #10 on: April 27, 2010, 06:36:03 PM »
Anyone else wonder how or why an oil rig "explodes" a week after a coal mine "explodes"? Next week an airliner will "explode", then a dairy farm will "explode" and o will stand on the ashes and will call for federal regulation of those industries too, and the sheeple  will all nod and say he is right. Remember swine flu? , it was the media generated disease to pass health care reform.

Offline FourBee

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #11 on: April 27, 2010, 06:44:49 PM »
Anyone else wonder how or why an oil rig "explodes" a week after a coal mine "explodes"? Next week an airliner will "explode", then a dairy farm will "explode" and o will stand on the ashes and will call for federal regulation of those industries too, and the sheeple  will all nod and say he is right. Remember swine flu? , it was the media generated disease to pass health care reform.

Sure smells fishy don't it. :o
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Offline mirage1988

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #12 on: April 27, 2010, 06:59:39 PM »
Anyone else wonder how or why an oil rig "explodes" a week after a coal mine "explodes"? Next week an airliner will "explode", then a dairy farm will "explode" and o will stand on the ashes and will call for federal regulation of those industries too, and the sheeple  will all nod and say he is right. Remember swine flu? , it was the media generated disease to pass health care reform.

Sure smells fishy don't it. :o
Oops, I forgot reforming the student loan industry ( they covered that in the health care bill because they are so closely related  ???)  and the banking industry- o is  accusing the banks of making deals "under the cover of darkness" , while he is doing the same!?

Offline steve y

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #13 on: April 27, 2010, 07:15:13 PM »
Sounds like everything is going to blow up next. Do ya think Iran is ready to launch one yet? Steve

Offline mirage1988

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #14 on: April 27, 2010, 07:25:32 PM »
Iran has no reason to launch one, they with the rest of the world are eating popcorn and watching america implode.

Offline BBF

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #15 on: April 28, 2010, 09:35:52 AM »
I had wondered in the past just how much it costs just to make those fuel rods in the first place. I know they require centrefuges, I presume they don't run on thin air.
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Offline Dixie Dude

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #16 on: April 28, 2010, 10:56:59 AM »
There is enough uranium in plain ofd granite rock to make nuclear power usable for centuries.  Granite is 5% uranium.  We have a lot of granite around.  It is pulverized into dust, the uranium seperated, and the remaining granite is mixed with expoxy and made into granite countertops for building.  If the government used breeder reactors in the military ships, they could burn up 90% of the waste from conventional reactors.  The reactors could be put in abandoned coal mines very deep in the ground to be protected from even a nuclear bomb.  Most coal mines and electrical needs are east of the Mississippi so the coal mines with nuclear power plants could be built from Alabama to southern New York could provide most of the eastern power.  Combined with offshore windmills from North Carolina to New England that can provide all the power along the east coast, they should provide all the power we need for years to come.  The plains states can produce enough wind power to provide all the power west of the Mississippi to the Rockies.  In the southwest solar plants in the deserts can provide almost all the power.  Nuclear and wind can be done now, as well as solar.  One square mile of solar panels in space can beam back as much power as a nuclear power plant at about the same cost. 

Offline teamnelson

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #17 on: April 28, 2010, 12:04:55 PM »
TNel....if some 'power' has the technology to track 40 or more dense naval nuke reactors from space, and to eliminate them with beam weapons in just a few minutes or days,,,and they leaked in unison....life on this planet would likely cease to exist has we know it...you agree.?  In fact, I'm sure all reactors on the planet are targets for somebody someplace...figure that into feasible defense planning scenarios.
..TM7

I'm not familiar with the beam weapon you mention; my limited training in wave theory leads me to believe that getting one to penetrate a hull through several hundred feet of water would be a neat trick. Got a link for that? Not finding it in Jane's.
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Offline saddlebum

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #18 on: April 28, 2010, 01:42:38 PM »
NOW I'M REALLY TICKED OFF!!!!   I just heard from the Wall Street Journal that the blow out preventer on the well head DID NOT have a remote control shut-off because it is not required by law in the US. I can't believe that we have to have a law for everything in this country to get it done. All the rigs I worked on in the 10yrs I roughnecked, ON LAND, had emergency,(remote), shut-off valves on the BOP that would cut the drill stem in two if need be to stop a blowout. This outfit didn't have that according to WSJ. I find it hard to believe. I have never worked off shore so maybe I'm missing something here.
My little rant here just brought something else to mind. If they had pipe in the hole when it blew and there is pipe in the BOP, they will never get it shut and stop the flow manually. You can't pinch off the drill stem turning the valves by hand or robot. You have to use the hydraulics, which blew up. I keep listening for more details but the 11 men who died were probably the ones that would know what happened.
" FIREARMS STAND NEXT IN IMPORTANCE TO THE CONSTITUTION ITSELF. THEY ARE THE AMERICAN PEOPLE'S LIBERTY TEETH AND KEYSTONE UNDER INDEPENDENCE."       George Washington

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Offline teamnelson

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #19 on: April 28, 2010, 01:49:12 PM »
Coast Guard is going to fire it to burn off the oil spill, sound like. I don't know, can folks be working underneath the blaze to shut off the leak? I picture an eternal flame in the gulf now.
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Offline saddlebum

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #20 on: April 28, 2010, 02:09:36 PM »
I have never worked off shore but I do believe that if they can't get it shut down they can blow it up at the sea floor to get it to stop flowing, I think. No chance of working that well again after that. I thought I heard they are in 5000ft water out there so I don't know what that entails. Lowering explosives to the sea floor and setting it off. Can't let it burn forever. Al Gore would never stand for that.
" FIREARMS STAND NEXT IN IMPORTANCE TO THE CONSTITUTION ITSELF. THEY ARE THE AMERICAN PEOPLE'S LIBERTY TEETH AND KEYSTONE UNDER INDEPENDENCE."       George Washington

“OUR CONSTITUTION WAS MADE ONLY FOR A MORAL AND RELIGIOUS PEOPLE. IT IS WHOLLY INADEQUATE TO THE GOVERNMENT OF ANY OTHER."           John Adams

Offline saddlebum

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #21 on: April 28, 2010, 02:55:20 PM »
This is a picture of the BOP,(valves) that is 5000ft under water on the sea floor that needs to get closed. After finding more info. it sounds like they had a gas blowout. While producing oil they got a presure surge,(big gas bubble), from the well and it caught them by surprise. That should not have happened unless all the warning devices were broke or nobody was paying attention. Gas blowout would explain the explosion. One report said they were trying to close the BOP with hydraulics but I don't know how they could at 5000ft and the rig laying next to it on the sea floor. Also heard using the robots to close the valves manually ain't working, yet.
" FIREARMS STAND NEXT IN IMPORTANCE TO THE CONSTITUTION ITSELF. THEY ARE THE AMERICAN PEOPLE'S LIBERTY TEETH AND KEYSTONE UNDER INDEPENDENCE."       George Washington

“OUR CONSTITUTION WAS MADE ONLY FOR A MORAL AND RELIGIOUS PEOPLE. IT IS WHOLLY INADEQUATE TO THE GOVERNMENT OF ANY OTHER."           John Adams

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #22 on: April 28, 2010, 03:30:37 PM »
Now I don't know about shutting off wells.  But I was Coast Guard and those boys don't know anything about setting fire to oil on the Ocean.  I can see this is going to go badly for some enlisted personnel.

Offline blind ear

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #23 on: April 29, 2010, 03:22:56 AM »
Another unbridled Coorporation strikes.
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Offline magooch

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #24 on: April 29, 2010, 03:50:13 AM »
Yeah, it's going to take big unbridled government to clean up this mess.  It'll require a huge vacuum device to suck it all up.  I can't think of anything that sucks more than the federal government that we have now.
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Offline LabRat2k3

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #25 on: April 29, 2010, 05:01:07 AM »
Nuclear power is unsafe? How many people have died in the coal and oil industry in the US this year? Now how many have died in the nuclear power industry in the US since the first plant was built?  Given these numbers which one do you think is the most safe?

Offline Sourdough

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #26 on: April 29, 2010, 07:48:01 PM »
BP was operating that Rig, they are responsiable.  Remember folks BP, stands for British Petroleum.  And our experience with them here in Alaska is that they only do what they have to, after they get caught not doing it.
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Offline FourBee

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #27 on: April 30, 2010, 05:19:48 AM »

The collapsed deepwater oil rig is leaking 42,000 gals of oil per day and the spill is heading for shore.  It already covers an approx. 40 square mile area.    If crews can't shut off the flow soon it may take several months.   Let's pray that this looming catastrophe is nipped in the bud.

 ps  4/29/2010: This mornings newpaper said the leak is closer to 275,000 gals per day, and will possibly start a burn-off today.
4/30/2010:  Head of Oil Slick has hit the Coasts of Louisana this morning.  Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal, whose state is still recovering from the ravages of Hurricane Katrina in 2005, declared a state of emergency and asked the Defense Department for funds to deploy up to 6,000 National Guard troops to help.
   

 ::) Here it comes !
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Offline billy_56081

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #28 on: April 30, 2010, 05:43:39 AM »
TM if you think mining is unregulated you have never dealt with MSHA. That was probably the silliest statement you have ever made. Now something failed there as all mechanical devices can. But my friend under regulation was not the issue. Some of your supposed "knowledge" is far from reality. Trust me I deal with MSHA and under regulation is a nonissue.
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Offline BBF

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Re: Looming Catastrope
« Reply #29 on: April 30, 2010, 05:47:38 AM »
Lets see if Jindal gets Fed money. He isn't a Admin supporter.
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