[Tanada]

http://content.usatoday.com/communities ... ouisiana/1

It has happened again off the coast of LA this afternoon

[pup55]

WASHINGTON (AFP) – An explosion ripped through an oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico on Thursday dumping 13 people into the water, one of whom was injured, the US Coast Guard said.

"All 13 are accounted for and they are all wearing some sort of an immersion suit that protects them from the water," Coast Guard chief petty officer John Edwards told MSNBC.

Nine helicopters had been dispatched to the rig 80 miles (130 kilometers) south of Vermilion Bay in Louisiana, the spokesman said, adding the extent of any injuries suffered by the workers was not immediately clear.

Four Coast Guard cutters were also en route to the rig, said to be owned by Mariner Energy, and which was reportedly still ablaze.

"Right now we're focused on search and rescue and then, ultimately, as this thing progresses we're going to be looking into the cause," Edwards added.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20100902/ts_alt_afp/usblastoil_20100902155402

[Plantagenet]

Obama must've forgotten his promise to send "SWAT" teams to do safety inspections on the offshore oil rigs----he probably was distracted after the BP oil spill by more important things like designing the rug and picking out the earth-tone color scheme for the White House extreme make-over he just did.

[Outcast_Searcher]

Obama must've forgotten his promise to send "SWAT" teams to do safety inspections on the offshore oil rigs----he probably was distracted after the BP oil spill by more important things like designing the rug and picking out the earth-tone color scheme for the White House extreme make-over he just did.

I have plenty of rocks to throw at Obamanomics and wealth transfers. And false campaign promises, etc.

However, this new explosion, and the fact that tests (more rigorous than the standard pre-BP-spill tests - source WSJ print article about a week ago) on various BOP's are showing that apparently they aren't nearly as reliable as thought/claimed, seem to justify his caution about drilling in deep water in the gulf.

But the right wingers have a total FIT about the moratorium and claim it's totally unnecessary.

Blaming Obama for everything, especially on issues like this where the GOP's policies are shown not to work takes your credibility away when you blame him for the stuff he is royally screwing up on.

So which is it? Drill away or safety first? You can't have it both ways.

[rockdoc123]

Shall we get our facts straight first? The fire happened in quarters while the crew was painting, chipping etc. Safety shutoffs all worked, there were no spills and no injuries. This was not a blowout like Macondo and had nothing to do with drilling operations. Regulations put in place to avoid a Macondo disaster would only indirectly address something like this.

[efarmer]

Plantagenet like many of us wishes to see some concrete movement in a logical and sustainable direction accomplished in a fashion that is not a goody bubble bought with national debt.
I had an anger focus "jones" with Bush, which gave me someone to concentrate on, but in the end was a complete waste of my energy. I still feel that the housing bubble was just supposed to be a pacifier for spoiled Americans while the Iraq campaign was securing open ended low cost petroleum from a new ally that was a starter project to make a Western style cultural change in the Middle East.
It sounds crazier now than it struck me as back then. The new flow of long term cheap oil was supposed to cover the sins of subprime stimulated and passed through the wholes system to end up getting swindled off by the grifters in New York for big commissions for screwing foreign central bankers and investors. I really believe Bush and Cheney thought that they were doing a brilliant set of moves to keep the system not only running BAU but able to expand under the same paradigms that that drove explosive growth spurt since WWII. I.E. the Oil Boys were going to shoot out goodies to placate the brats while they worked a wrinkle to tap the big reservoirs and put another 30 year
cushion under the brats so they would not have to think or sacrifice. It could have worked even though it goes against what I see as required or sustainable. They were right that they had to keep the brats happy and preoccupied or not have enough time to try anything. This is a large part of what Obama is doing as he attempts his agenda, which people may hate or love as well.

The plans we actually try are implemented under cover stories with disastrous results, the plans we need can not be discussed because they demand sacrifice from people who are spoiled and want instant comfort. We won't get there by having corporate pawns in Congress swap chairs either.

Deep oil is risky and expensive, it is going to sap much oil company resources to safely tap and the
tendency to go light on older petroleum infrastructure to make the budgets work will require the industry and government inspections and regulators to team up and do better than they have in the
way of keeping what is existing working while the new frontier is pursued.

Considering the vast infrastructure petroleum has installed, the American industry does a very good job of keeping it operating safely, but they will have to do even better, the infrastructure is aging and the new frontier of the industry is in almost impossible environments that reduce the margin of safety more going forward. This is often hard to acknowledge for folks who wish we would abandon petroleum right now but are unable to explain how to keep from civil war and widespread chaos without a plan or a viable technology path to mitigate petroleum dependence instead of doing what we have done and which is failing to work in the realities of the down slope of petroleum exploitation. When you do not face reality with a plan and a willingness to face sacrifice and know why you are accepting sacrifice, you end up with people scapegoating each other in politics and society and meandering blindly toward a string of disasters to scapegoat about some more.

Is petroleum to be a vital bridge from here to where we need to get, or is it an opium to keep a nation of brats medicated and content in the terminal phase of their addiction?