MY BAD ALERT: Gulf Spill now 3x as big as the Jamaica estimate in my last post based on data 48 hours old.

Yeah, I screwed up--I should have checked gNews for the latest on this because when I did (after posting that "Spill reported to be 5x worse than originally estimated—210k gallons a day still spewing into Gulf of Mexico" post) I found an article at USAToday.com reporting that the GoM spill is 3x larger than it was two days ago:

VENICE, La. (AP) — The surface area of a catastrophic Gulf of Mexico oil spill quickly tripled in size amid growing fears among experts that the slick could become vastly more devastating than it seemed just two days ago.

Frustrated fishermen eager to help contain the spill from a ruptured underwater well had to keep their boats idle Saturday as another day of rough seas kept crews away from the slick.

President Obama planned a Sunday trip to the Gulf Coast to see the damage himself.

Documents also emerged showing BP PLC downplayed the possibility of a catastrophic accident at the offshore rig that exploded. BP operated the rig, which was owned by Transocean Ltd.

How far the spill will reach is unknown, but the sheen already has reached into precious shoreline habitat and remains unstopped, raising fears that the ruptured well could be pouring more oil into the gulf than estimated.

The Coast Guard has estimated that about 200,000 gallons of oil are spewing out each day which would mean 1.6 million gallons of oil have spilled since the April 20 explosion that killed 11 workers. The environmental mess could eclipse the Exxon Valdez disaster, when an oil tanker spilled 11 million gallons off Alaska's shores in 1989.

via usatoday.com

Meanwhile, NPR.org is reporting in a headline:

Containment Booms No Help; Slick Oozes To Shore

Meanwhile pt2, news.bbc.co.uk has a great article up, featuring commentary from people local to the GoM spill and how it is already changing their lives and livelihoods as they wait to see what damage it causes.

I've also read that conservatives are calling this "Obama's Katrina." Well, I beg to differ--Obama was not celebrating his birthday with John McCain when the story broke. Also, this could not have been foreseen--unlike Katrina which National Geographic had predicted a year before it happened.

Then again, Obama *did* just call for more offshore drilling about a month ago.

sigh...

But see what happens when you do 30 seconds of additional research? You learn all kinds of crap! So, sorry about that! I saw the sexy chart and wanted to post it ASAP. So, I did and... oh well...

Posted via web from thepete's posterous