Obviously, since I’m not an expert on petroleum extraction on any level, there is nothing here which will uncover anything really new. There are some people who know, but we can’t be sure if all those yakking about it really know. Then, we can’t be sure those who know are telling us the truth.
Let’s get one thing clear: The US government and BP both are lying, mostly in their desperate measures to prevent the rest of us knowing. “Don’t want folks to panic…” The mainstream media is lying because truth offers no profits.
I think this sucker is out of control permanently. You can read the same sources I do. I’m not the only one pretty sure this well can’t be shut off. I believe the evidence shows the entire well casing is compromised, and I tend to think it’s broken all the way down through the seabed, since there is ample testimony the whole thing was the shoddiest ever, at the one time and place when it needed to be the best ever. One fellow says the pressure is above 20,00 PSI, some ten times the highest pressure oil drillers usually deal with. I’m betting this gusher has already chewed up just about all that was left of the well casing, and will simply be spewing upward through a ragged hole in the earth’s mantle very soon.
I really doubt anyone on this earth knows what comes after that. What little we hear from the Greenies is probably the standard hyperbole. On the other hand, I am ashamed so many libertarian sites are trying to tell us “all is well, nature will take care of things by itself, it’s just a little messy is all.” I can’t begin to guess just how it will affect us, not to mention the sea life in the Gulf and anywhere that stuff spreads, but it won’t be nice. I’ve been around raw petroleum just enough to know it’s not too bad in low concentrations, but it’s not pleasant. Further, I know from chemistry and such all the components of what is coming out of that hole in the seabed are toxic at rather low levels. And then you have to add the downright evil decision to toss that nasty Corexit stuff by the tons into the water. Never mind the oil, that much Corexit by itself will kill just about everything in the water. Then it will evaporate with the water and rain back down on the earth.
So my poorly educated expectations range between somewhat polluted ocean and beaches on the low end, to vast stretches of uninhabitable wastelands on the high end. Add to that a nasty cloud of pollution which chases the Gulf Stream up the Atlantic Coast, over to Iceland and Greenland, and some up along the fjords of Norway. A lot of it would simply circulate endlessly between the Gulf and West Africa on either side of the 25° north latitude line in the Middle Atlantic. If it stays with the Gulf Stream Return flow, that means back down the US Atlantic Coast down deep, and then around the northeast side of South America, down under the Amazon outflow, and along the coast toward Antarctica. More likely it will simply ride the warm flow until it precipitates, evaporates, washes ashore or disperses.
This all presumes no other disaster of similar scale changes things. I think life for millions of people will soon be very, very unpleasant from this cause alone, provided they survive.
