Spill Baby Spill!

I was at the National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration ( NOAA) website, getting updated on what is happening with Hurricane Ike, and came across this information….

Month-long Response Continues for New Orleans Oil Spill

New Orleans, LA 2008-Jul-23 Broken Barge Removal
On July 23, 2008, a tanker and barge collided near downtown New Orleans, LA, resulting in a spill of over 9000 barrels (380,000) gallons of #6 fuel oil. The incident occurred at approximately 0130 local time. The barge was reported “ripped in half,” discharging its entire contents. Coast Guard, Louisiana State and NOAA responders are on-scene.

Tue, 26 Aug 2008 20:31:46 EDT
On 23 July, 2008, a collision resulted in more than 420,000 gallons of heavy fuel oil being spilled into the Mississippi River when a barge struck a tanker and sank. More than 2,000 responders from many organizations, including NOAA, have been working on cleanup efforts for the last month. The barge has been salvaged, and most of the affected river (100 miles) has been cleaned up. However, more than 10 miles of stranded oil remains, and cleanup efforts have been complicated by a 6-foot drop in the river level. Conventional flushing is not effective (even with hot water and relatively high pressure), because the stranded oil is “high and dry.” The current challenge is to find the right cleanup technique.

In any case, many hundreds of thousands of gallons of crude oil were dumped into the waters of the Mississippi River. A month later, they were still trying to clean up, when along came Hurricane Gustav. There are no clean up updates posted after the hurricaine, as the crude oil spill was probably spread throughout the region & waterway in storm surge waters.

This is a photo of an oil stained levee.
The point of mentioning this spill, is while the RNC had crowds chanting Drill Baby Drill, there are serious issues that need to be addressed with drilling.

Off shore drilling is full of peril, and especially the drilling they want to do- on the West Coast (Alaska, Washington State , Oregon & California) is in the “Ring-of-Fire”, The Pacific Ring of Fire is an area of frequent earthquakes and volcanic eruptions encircling the basin of the Pacific Ocean. In a 40,000 km horseshoe shape, it is associated with a nearly continuous series of oceanic trenches, volcanic arcs, and volcanic belts and/or plate movements. The Ring of Fire has 452 volcanoes and is home to over 75% of the world’s active and dormant volcanoes. Ninety percent of the world’s earthquakes and 80% of the world’s largest earthquakes occur along the Ring of Fire.

Oil drilling is dangerous, sloppy, and if the drilling itself goes well, the movement of oil in tankers has been a series of huge spills with grave consequences to the Oceanic habitat & health, as well as the wildlife it supports.
It is a part of our overall Planetary health too. It is our job to take care of this planet we call home.
Drilling in earthquake zones makes no sense. Continuing on the path of oil dependence makes no sense, give we now know the greenhouse effect, and the SCIENCE that documents the changes.
VP candidate Sarah Palin says a federal government decision to protect the polar bear will cripple energy (oil) development offshore. As a result, she is suing (May 2008) the Bush administration, which ruled the polar bear is endangered and needs protection.

Governor Palin would also like to bring open-cast coal mining to Alaska’s Brooks Range Mountains, an act of environmental vandalism in the eyes of many.

The Palin administration has allowed Chevron to triple the amount of toxic waste it pours into the waters of Cook Inlet. This, even though the number of Beluga whales in the bay has collapsed from 1,300 to 350 – the point of extinction – because of pollution and increased ship traffic.

While Palin smiles and introduces herself as a benign “Hockey Mom”, she is really a foe of the environment.

She is OK with letting the Polar Bear go Extinct, by fighting the Endangered Species protection that would guard the habitat essential for the bear’s survival.

If you want to read more about how Scientists & Environmentalist groups fought to list the Polar bear as endangered, how the listing was stalled, allowing the government to proceed with an auction for oil and gas leases in the Alaska’s Chukchi Sea, an area of key habitat for polar bears. (Scroll down to U.S. endangered species legislation).

Oil wells don’t necessarily end well.

Crossposted at Ramblings.

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Travelers’ Advisory: Brachylagus idahoensis

Originally published March 2007 at BFD Blog!

It was announced by authorities in the state of Washington that last week 20 mamalian life forms identfied as Brachylagus idahoensis, which are of the order Lagomorpha, and family Leporidae, left captivity and are roaming free in Washington state. Previously 8 of the animals were being held in Portland, Oregon, and 12 of the animals were held in Pullman, Washington. State Authorities assured the public that 70 of the 90 known remaining Brachylagus idahoensis’ in the world are still under their control, in captivity. All of these animals are descendents of the last 16 remaining Brachylagus idahoensis’ on Earth, which were captured in 2001, which have apparently multiplied since their initial capture.

These animals are known to be foraging some where in the Columbia River basin of Washington state. Travelers to the area should be aware, these animals are known to be prolific tunnel builders, hikers should proceed with caution to avoid falling in to a tunnel trap. These animals are not known to be carnivorous and there are no known reports of attacks on humans, but humans should proceed with caution if encountering this species.

For more information about this escape to the wild by these animals please refer to the article in the Los Angeles Times that you will find here.

To aid the public in identifying these wild animals, the following picture was released by the authorities:

We have since, learned…

Maybe it was not such a great idea. As previously noted at BFD Blog!, 20 Brachylagus idahoensis, commonly known as pygmy rabbits, were returned to the wild by authorities in Washington state. This was an attempt to repopulate the nearly extinct little cuddly guys and gals. It seems, as noted in this piece published by the Los Angeles Times (from an Associated Press report) on April 12, that 14 of the original 20 rabbits released have become some other creatures’ lunch.

“EPHRATA, WASH. — The 20 endangered pygmy rabbits that were reintroduced to the wild with great fanfare last month aren’t faring so well.

Fourteen of the 20 rabbits have been killed by predators.

Only four of the rabbits released March 13 remained at the Sagebrush Flat Wildlife Area, said David Hays, pygmy rabbit coordinator for the state Department of Fish and Wildlife.

Hays said two males were removed earlier this month and will be returned at the end of April. The other 14 rabbits are believed to have fallen victim to predators, mainly coyotes, but also hawks and owls.

The 3,700-acre release site has been watched daily by Department of Fish and Wildlife staff. Several of the rabbits were fitted with GPS monitors.

Of the four rabbits remaining at the site, three are females who could be pregnant, officials said. Hays said the rapid decline in population did not doom the multimillion-dollar project.

More rabbits will be released in the area, he said, and experts are looking for ways to reduce predation.”

One would think it would have previously occured to those highly educated and specialized minds responsible for protecting this species that the reason why the rabbits needed to be reintroduced to their natural environment was a good reason not to do so. We have a suggestion before the rest of the pygmy rabbits are sacrificed, how about releasing a group in to the Biosphere in Arizona, in sort of a half-way house arrangement. Let them multiply there until there really are significant numbers of them, then, release some, not all of them, but a much greater number than 20 to their natural habitat. Perhaps then, despite natural predation, enough will survive and reproduce to bring them back in greater numbers.

And to think that staff at BFD Blog! were able to figure this out with only (just barely) a high school diploma.

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