HOLY HELL ROV films oil leak coming from rock cracks on seafloor

You are going to eat your words.

Speculation my arse. It's just common sense to protect your children and unborn baby KNOWING that the air quality from the gushing oil and chemical dispersants is going to blow in from the gulf.

Not to mention the very distinct possiblity evacuations will be ordered. And when they announce it there will be little to no time to move ahead of the crowd.

what? a flood to be carried away from a flood? how is this informative? how is this helpful to the people on the Gulf.
a whole lotta stuff happens that you could match to any quote from the bible. How about we're way past revelations.

The more pressure put on the gusher, the more oil will be forced into the seabed, right?

Cave in? A lot of oil drilling has taken place in the world and I've never heard of earth caving in as an oil field gets progressively depleted.

Also, watch the first live feed there. There appears to be a leak on the BOP, BELOW the containment cap! It is smallish, but very visible. The integrity of that BOP is coming into great question. The pressure on the sea floor is intense. They never should have drilled here.

Yes, I read that, too. However, they were all standing around a leaking tank and it isn't confirmed what it was leaking. I also don't necessarily believe every story about someone reporting they felt sick. I'm more inclined to believe fisherman who have been out IN the oil who report that. That said, there are lots of people on the water, right in the thick of it. They may have problems, but someone in some town in Florida is not the same! My GOD, half of the mods here live on the Gulf.

Don't get me wrong, I think this is catastrophic, but for the ANIMALS who live in that water and in those marshes, not the people in the Gulf states (not counting economies, here). Houston and NOLA, near the chemical plants, are chemical SEWERS that have been spewing and pumping these toxins for decades.

No one has mentioned what will happen when this sink hole opens up.

The Great Lakes will be drained down thru the Mississippi River.

The River will be 25-50 miles wide. Everything along it will be destroyed.

Happy landings!

You people that live in that area should really consider fleeing, my prayers are with you.

I admit to not understanding the mechanics of these cracks but I somehow imagine it blowing outwards as opposed to caving in.

Like the pressure just gets to be too much and it explodes.

That is because they replace it with something else ...like water.........


And what is coming out of the see floor isn't Oil.

It's Mehtane.

Oh, bloody hell.

This sucks.

:eyes_drope:

From what I remember reading the oil is between layers of rock. So as the amount of oil gets depleted the layer of rocks could get a bit "rearranged" but there won't be a big cave in. The oil is not in a cave with nothing else but itself holding the thing from collapsing.

Half our mods live on the Gulf. I believe Trinity has children. You ask him how the air is. Your engaging in hysteria is NOT helpful. It is a disaster, yes, BUT NOT ON LAND.

Now, you go start a thread about Houston where these vile chemicals have been put into the water and air for DECADES. Those people down there ARE in danger. Same for the ones who live around over 700 chemical plants near NOLA. You won't thought because you're getting your doom fix by telling people to leave the Gulf states.

Have you factored this in:

"EPA tested the air in the Gulf and following are now airborne: Hydrogen Sulphide at 1200 pts/bil (acceptable is 5-10), Benzene at 3000 pts/bill (acceptable is 0-4) and last but not least a little gem called Methaline Chloride at 3000-4000 pts/bill (acceptable is 61). OK, so we now have toxic gases heading inland to LA, MS and FL along with the raw crude oil and hurricane season is knocking at the door. There have already been numerous reports of fisherman (w/o proper breathing protection I'm sure) becoming ill."

You're comparing chemical plants to gaping holes spewing tons of oil unstopped from the largest oil field known to man?

For what has been almost two months and could easily turn into six or more?

When it has been proven during the cleanup of the Exxon Valdez that this crude causes lifelong sickness and cancer to grown men but has unknown effects on the unborn or children?

And you're more worried about the animals (God bless them)?

Knowing how the evacuations were handled during Katrina and Rita?

I almost always agree with your posts and assessments but we absolutely part ways here.

Well...spending money on sealing the well was a complete waste.

Lets just hope this gets out to the MSM or some one with ties to TV Channels. People need to see this!

Surely someone from the media would be watching those cameras.

From what I understand the topography of the seabed has not been fully studied. Do they really know the geological outlay of the crust down there or are they surmising?

HE HE GUYS LISTEN UP

SHR HAS EXPLAINED THESE ODDS IN IS THREAD

SO NOW YOU GONNA SHOUT TO EACHOTHER, CALM DOWN AND TRY TO THINK. THEY ARE STILL DRILLING FOR RELIEF=CEMENT THAT SHIT

BUT HE HAS EXPLAINED TOO THAT ITS A RACE AGAINST TIME

WHICH ONE IS FASTER??

I AGREE THE ODDS ARE TURNING IN A BAD DIRECTION

Did SHR explain this?

"No one has mentioned what will happen when this sink hole opens up.

The Great Lakes will be drained down thru the Mississippi River.

The River will be 25-50 miles wide. Everything along it will be destroyed.

Happy landings!"

Good God you are dense. The air now vs. the air in a month are two totally different things. It's only going to get worse because things are not getting better. Do you not realize that? A woman is 37 weeks pregnant. In another week or two she will likely be giving birth. Or have a newborn. So you think she should just wait until the inevitable? Until a Cat 5 storm blows oil all over her home? Until a pocket of poisonous gas kills her family? Until her family starts suffering from severe health problems? Until the gulf is completely destroyed and there's no way to make a living unless you work for BP? This oil disaster is just beginning. It is beyond epic. Anyone with any intelligence whatsover has to realize this won't end well for any average person in the area. The smarter people who want to survive are already making plans to leave or are gone.

I'm not talking about Houston. If you care so much about Houston atm then your head is in the sand. Start your own flipping thread about Houston, I owe you nothing. And, for now, I'm done arguing with short-sighted stupidity as time will show how wrong you are anyway.

I personally saw many leaks coming from the seafloor the first weekend of live cam footage...

An eruption of oil overtook the rov and it was trying to find its bearings, it panned the cam left and you could see 4 or 5 plumes coming from the seafloor.

This is horrible. I hadnt seen anything since and thought maybe I didnt see it but this is evidence right here..

Yes, I have. What do you suppose the EPA air quality tests show for the BP plant in Texas City and other chemical soups? I'm sure the air out in the water and oil is foul as hell, but that doesn't take into account that chemicals do disapate in the air and wind. Someone in Orlando or even Pensacola is not the same as being out in the water coated with oil.

You've written about Monsanto. They've contaminated many places where people are living and I mean the soil. If people knew the half of what's out there, where people are living, they'd freak. And, Christ on a bike, fucking nuclear bombs have been detonated in New Mexico and Nevada! Radioactive spills have occurred in Washington state. You don't see the doomtards here screaming for every to GET OUT, GET OUT, GET OUT!

The lizards would love nothing more than for people to panic and move away from the Gulf states.

The amount of oil spilled out of this out of control well is so far miniscule compared to what has been pumped out of other formations all over the world.

Those other places areound the world, with a LOT more oil removed than has come out here, have NOT had the collapses that people are bandying about here. Some of the stuff posted here is pure fear mongering.

This IS going to be the largest enviromental disaster probably since Tambora blew up in 1816, and the largest man made one ever, but no sense in blowing it out of proportion.

Every indication is that we are still in the early phases of this disaster, that it is going to get much worse, but people still need to act rationally. Now if they decide to nuke this thing ... then I too would absolutely panic since I think there is a good chance it would blow the whole formation wide open.

I do think everyone living around the gulf needs to start thinking about moving away but there is still time to do it rationally. The fumes around the Gulf are NOT good to breath and will act like a long term industrial exposure problem ... ie: health deteriorating over time and probably lots of breathing problems and cancer down the road. The economy in the Gulf is going to go in the tanker since who wants to go on vacation to a place that smells like chemical and the water looks like the Cuyahoga River of old.

Those with kids should think about moving before the new school year starts imo so as to limit the airborn chemical exposure to their growing bodies as this spill gets worse over the next few months.

Eventually some of the chemicals may start to end up in the drinking water ... but baring a complete collapse of the well head or huge secondary leaking starting the concentrations of those in dangerous amounts is still probably 6 months to a year away in most areas.

No need to "FLEE" this week, but do start making contingency plans in the event that they can not bring this well under control (and I don't think they will be able to)

[link to www.physics.rutgers.edu]

Catastrophic Methane Hydrate Release Mitigation

This topic falls under the category of abrupt climate change as will be clear shortly. Methane hydrates or clathrates are combinations of water and methane in the form
of an ice-like matrix. The methane is the result of the action of methanogenic bacteria on sediment over thousands of years. The methane is kept in an ice form where appropriate combinations of temperature and pressure exist.

Methane hydrates are widespread in sea sediments hundreds of meters below the sea floor along the outer continental margins and are also found in Arctic permafrost. Some eposits are close to the ocean floor and at water depths as
shallow as 150 m, although at low latitudes they are generally only found below 500 m. The deposits can be 300-600 m thick and cover large horizontal areas. A nearby
deposit nearly 500 km in length is found along the Blake Ridge off the coast of N.C. at depths of 2000-4000 m.

The total quantity of methane hydrates in the ocean sediment is estimated to be around 10,000 GtC. The methane hydrates in sediment considered part of U.S. territory alone could supply U.S. natural gas needs for 1000 years. Because of this enormous quantity, methane hydrates are being investigated as an energy source to replace petroleum and conventional sources of natural gas, although an extraction technology for ocean sediments does not presently exist.

There is some evidence that massive releases of methane from ocean sediment hydrate deposits may have been indirectly responsible for ending some of the ice
ages. Were such releases to occur today because of warming of the oceans or as a result of seismic events, the result could be a sudden rise in atmospheric temperature, triggering feedback mechanisms that might lead to rapid melting of polar ice.

In the slides, the example of a 1 GtC release was used. That represents 0.01% of the total methane hydrates in the ocean. The quantity degassed to the atmosphere 15,000 years ago, at the end of the last ice age is now believed to be around 4 GtC as methane or 0.04%. The average temperature of the Earth increased from 30°F to 60°F within a few decades. The radiative forcing from the methane alone would
have been insufficient to cause more than a 3°F increase. It is thought that feedback effects from additional methane released from melting permafrost, carbon dioxide and water vapor contributed to the rest of the warming. But the initial methane hydrate release from the ocean may have been the catalyst.

All of the conditions that may have led to the methane hydrate release 15,000 years ago do not exist today. Sea levels were much lower and thus, the pressure on the
sediments was less. However, there is some evidence that ocean currents that impinge on ocean sediments are getting warmer, especially in the Arctic. Global warming is thus a possible triggering mechanism for massive methane hydrate
release in today’s climate.

What causes release of methane hydrates is still poorly understood. Warm waters may destabilize the hydrate zone. Hydrates on the surface of the ocean floor on a ridge may then degass. The sediment may then become unstable and slide down the ridge, exposing other layers of methane hydrate, accelerating the release. As an example, the Storegga slump off the coast of Norway 8000 years ago could have released between 1 and 4 GtC as methane.

Alternatively, an undersea earthquake today, say off the Blake Ridge or the coast of Japan or California might loosen and cause some of the sediment to slide down the
ridge or slump, exposing the hydrate layer to the warmer water. That in turn could cause a chain reaction of events, leading to the release of massive quantities of methane.

Another possibility is drilling and other activities related to exploration and recovery of methane hydrates as an energy resource. The hydrates tend to occur in the pores of sediment and help to bind it together. Attempting to remove the hydrates may cause the sediment to collapse and release the hydrates. So, it may not take thousands of years to warm the ocean and the sediments enough to cause
massive releases, only lots of drilling rigs.

Returning to the 4 GtC release scenario, assume such a release occurs over a oneyear period sometime in the next 50 years as result of slope failure. According to the Report of the Methane Hydrate Advisory Committee, “Catastrophic slope failure appears to be necessary to release a sufficiently large quantity of methane rapidly
enough to be transported to the atmosphere without significant oxidation or dissolution.”

In this event, methane will enter the atmosphere as methane gas. It will have a residence time of several decades and a global warming potential of 62 times that of carbon dioxide over a 20-year period.

This would be the equivalent of 248 GtC as carbon dioxide or 31 times the annual man-made GHG emissions of today. Put another way, this would have the impact of nearly 30 years worth of GHG warming all at once. The result would almost
certainly be a rapid rise in the average air temperature, perhaps as much as 3°F immediately. This might be tolerable if that’s as far as things go. But, just like
15,000 years ago, if the feedback mechanisms kick in, we can expect rapid melting of
Greenland and Antarctic ice and an overall temperature increase of 30°F.

For point of reference, the average temperature of the Earth (atmosphere, land and top layer of the ocean) in 2004 is around 60°F. The methane hydrate release projected here would raise the temperature to around 90°F or more. Such high temperatures would undoubtedly destabilize all of the other methane hydrates in the ocean and arctic permafrost, some 10,000 GtC or 620,000 GtC equivalent as carbon dioxide. This would have the impact of 78,000 years worth of GHG warming over a few decades. The temperatures reached and sustained would most likely cause a rapid die off in ocean phytoplankton and other sea life as well as most land
plants and animals, including humans. The result would be a mass extinction and mark a major transition point in the Earth’s geological history.

Although a 1000 or 10,000 GtC methane release in one year or over several decades is very unlikely, a 4 GtC release is entirely plausible. Even if the feedback mechanisms that were operative 15,000 years ago became partly active, the outcome could be just as disastrous as the scenario outlined above.

Gaskill said that if any massive releases of methane from methane hydrates were to occur, attempts should be made to ignite and burn the methane gas at the ocean’s
surface. By converting the methane to carbon dioxide, the threat of abrupt climate change is reduced by a factor of 62, to less than one-years worth of GHG emissions.
Even if the mitigation effort is only partly successful, say 75% is converted to carbon dioxide, the remaining methane, equivalent to an 8-year pulse of all present
day GHG emissions in a single year might still spell trouble, but it would be far preferable to the nightmare scenarios outlined above.

Combustion could be accomplished by aerial release and ignition of distillate fuel over the area where the methane is entering the atmosphere. There are several potential problems with this approach. The area to be covered may be too large to effectively treat in this way. Advection may also make continuous burning difficult. Dr. MacCracken pointed out that the methane level in the air at the surface might be too low to ignite. This would, of course depend on how fast the gas is being released.

Regardless, the potential for massive methane release from sediments represents such a significant threat that emergency mitigation plans like the one suggested here
need to be prepared. The Methane Hydrate Research and Development Act of 2000, Public Law 106-193 does not address such catastrophic scenarios and we are unaware of anyone working on such plans