Oil Spill Disaster

When I watch the news and see the massive oil slick in the Gulf, it honestly makes me nauseous. I'm not even kidding, the mixture of dread, sadness and knowing all combine to make me a little bit queasy.

There are so many thoughts running through my head about this disaster. Didn't anyone have a plan in place for this sort of thing? It certainly doesn't seem like it. And in retrospect, when I hear the details of how far down the platform had drilled to get oil, I think "what the f*ck business did we think we had doing this?" I mean COME ON, we are a nation of smartass people, why have we sat back and not found a solution, an alternative, to offshore drilling? I work in a place that's curing cancer, for eff's sake, we are smart enough to come up with a new plan...why haven't we?

Oh wait. Probably because of all the people like the rich people with vacation homes in scenic vistas which also happen to be the perfect spot for a wind farm. Right. The same people who want to build their megamansions on eroding beach, mow down forests for their vacation cabin, shoot wolves from helicopters, and crush piping plovers under the tires of their gas-guzzling SUV's. But I digress...

I guess the reason I'm so cynical about this oil spill is because I've been there before. In 2003 I worked for a summer helping out with this environmental disaster. Let me tell you, compared to poor Louisiana, we were damn lucky. The Buzzards Bay oil spill took only 500 birds, which was a travesty at the time, but for NOLA and the gulf, 500 birds is gonna be the tip of the iceberg. The USCG, despite their best efforts, will absolutely NOT be able to contain the spill - I mean, we kind of already know that. Let me tell you what's going to happen (in my opinion/estimate): it's going to spread, it's going to wash up on the beach, and it's going to start coating and killing things. What it doesn't get on the shore, the slick will get as it slowly starts sinking to the bottom of the ocean, drifting through one layer of sea at a time, one ecosystem at a time, until in reaches the bottom and sits, smothering clams, shellfish, crabs, any other benthic creatures you have living down there. The birds are going to be absolutely covered with oil, and while some rescuers may be able to catch and clean them, for many it will be too late; birds instinctually preen their feathers, and whether or not they're fouled with oil is no exception. Feather preening will lead to oil ingestion, and this will lead to death. There will be carcasses washing onshore for weeks. Even after the oil is visibly gone, dead crap will be washing up for months.

My hope is that the cleanup is at least somewhat successful. The fact that Buzzards Bay and Barney's Joy made the recovery that they did is, in my inexpert opinion, nothing short of a miracle. I send good cleanup/recovery karma down to the Gulf, because they surely need it. It will be interesting to see how Obama's plans for offshore drilling change in the wake of this tragedy (hopefully they will). It will also be interesting to see how (or if) opinions change towards alternative forms of energy in the coming months. I am seriously keeping my fingers crossed. It's almost humorous to compare the environmental impact of a wind farm to the environmental impact of a massive oil spill. It's like comparing apples and a nuclear warhead. Let's get it together, people.

For me? I think it's time to think about moving closer to work where I can depend on public transportation and researching hybrid vehicles. Yeah, I dream of a brand new Subaru, but enough is enough, it's definitely time to break up with oil...a little bit at a time...