How Bad is the Oil Spill? Flight Sheds Light on Magnitude of Disaster

Follow-up to Video: The Gulf of Mexico Death Throes – Incredible Footage of the State of the Gulf Waters and the End Of Gulf Wildlife [Must Watch]

Author David Helvarg takes a flight from the shores of Alabama to the site of the BP Deepwater Horizon explosion. What he finds is disturbing.

Ten years ago I flew out to a BP Deepwater platform in the Gulf of Mexico to report on offshore drilling and was amazed I could see oil rigs all the way to the horizon. Now I’m appalled that from 2,000 feet up I can see heavy oil slicks all the way to the horizon.

On Monday, June 21, I flew out of Sonny Callahan Airport in Fairhope, Ala., with pilot Tom Hutchings of SouthWing, a nonprofit group whose T-shirt logo reads “Conservation through Aviation.”

Tom is an angular biologist with an MBA who loves to fly. John Wathan, who joined us, shooting photos and video through the open luggage door, is the Hurricane Creek Keeper, a member of Bobby Kennedy Jr.’s environmental group. An ex-construction contractor, John looks more like a former Hells Angel than a tree-hugger with his full white beard and red, white and blue headscarf.

John’s been flying with Tom since the third day after BP’s Deepwater Horizon rig sank and the Gulf of Mexico erupted with tens of thousands of barrels of oil per day, creating one of the most devastating eco-disasters in recent history.

In the days since I’d cut my “Saved by the Sea” book tour short to return to the Gulf, I’d been visiting oiled beaches, oiled pelicans, oil-soaked wetlands and the Louisiana Incident Command Center at a BP facility outside Houma where private security guards made me erase a digital photo of the building (I re-shot it from a public road). Scientists I know in Mississippi and Alabama both had the same reaction when I called them, laughing and saying they heard from me only during disasters (I’d last visited them after Hurricane Katrina).

We take off behind a Coast Guard Sentry aircraft and are quickly 1,000 feet over Mobile Bay.

“I’ve got some color, I got red in the bay,” John reports from the back of the plane, looking down where some oil appears to have floated in despite the bay’s freshwater outflow that has kept most oil at bay and off the state’s beaches until this week. Two miles out we spot our first wind-drift streaks of oil. 12 miles out the oil becomes more pronounced like the speckled fat in marbled meat.

“The water looks so unnatural the way the light comes off it now. It’s a dull yellow rather than shiny and sparkly reflections,” Tom notes.  He’s been flying these waters for 30 years.

“It’s flattened out the white caps [small waves],” John points out. “It’s like someone stretched Saran Wrap down on top of the water.”

BP Oil Disaster – Crude Awakening – Infographic Diagram

Note that this incredible infographic is 6 weeks out of date as of this post!! Click to See Full Image and Enlarge..

BP Oil Disaster – Benthic Community’s Importance To Coastal Estuaries – Infographic Diagram

BP Oil Disaster - Benthic Community's Importance To Coastal Estuaries – Infographic Diagram - Click To Enlarge..

BP Oil Disaster Simultaneous Operations Overview – Infographic Diagram

BP Oil Disaster Simultaneous Operations Overview - Infographic Diagram - Click To Enlarge..

BP Oil Disaster Relief Well and Subsea Containment – Infographic Diagram

BP Oil Disaster Relief Well and Subsea Containment - Infographic Diagram - Click To Enlarge..

Treachery In The Gulf – Madness? This Is Agenda 21! [Must Read]

By Robbi Skye Campbell
6-29-10

What has happened in the Gulf of Mexico was not by accident. It was most likely a design to support an agenda. What that agenda is we do not know exactly but I will try to connect the dots. We may soon know the true extent of its nature by the “solutions” our government imposes on the people in the Gulf area.

There are some major problems:

The Obama administration allowed BP to drill at an unstable site (highly over pressured) in 5,000 feet of water;

BP CEO Tony Hayward dumped his BP stock 2 months before the spill;

The well was kicking since they drilled into the production zone, so the drilling fluid or mud was underbalanced (mud weight not quite heavy enough for the upward pressure of the gas);

Goldman Sachs dumped 44% of BP stock and went short on Transocean stock the day before the spill;

The drilling crew knew that the annular blowout preventer was damaged and BP company man Kazula did not order it repaired;

BP company man Kazula was a greenhorn on the Deepwater Horizon (he was inexperienced);

The well was cased, cemented and had two cement abandonment plugs in place, so how could the well be kicking (trying to blow out)?;

BP company man Kazula sent away the Schlumberger team (supposed to do the cement bond log to check Halliburton’s cement job on the casing);

Despite this the BP company man made the decision to change the mud over to seawater (seawater is 40% lighter than the drilling mud). This is not logical;

Shouting match between the rig superintendent and the company man. Superintendent felt that the order to change over to seawater was irrational and suicidal;

During the changeover of the mud to seawater is when the blowout naturally occurred;

Jeff Rense & Jordan Maxwell – BP Gulf Coast Oil Spill Is Apocalyptic – [Audio] Parts 1-5

The Toronto G20 Riot Fraud: Undercover Police engaged in Purposeful Provocation At Tax Payers’ Expense – Identical Boots Exposed Undercover Police Provocateurs

by Terry Burrows

Toronto is right now in the midst of a massive government / media propaganda fraud. As events unfold, it is becoming increasingly clear that the ‘Black Bloc’ are undercover police operatives engaged in purposeful provocations to eclipse and invalidate legitimate G20 citizen protest by starting a riot. Government agents have been caught doing this before in Canada.
Montebello 2007 Riot Prevented – Identical Boots Exposed Undercover Police Provocateurs

At the ‘Security and Prosperity Partnership’ meeting protests at Montebello Quebec on August 20, 2007, a Quebec union leader caught and outed three masked undercover Quebec Provincial Police operatives dressed as ‘black bloc’ protestors about to start a riot by throwing rocks at the security police.

See the following videos documenting this event.

Stop SPP Protest – Union Leader stops provocateurs

Evidence — Police provoke Violence at SPP protest

The operation was exposed by the following picture of the undercover police wearing combat boots identical to those of the security police arresting them.
(Provocateurs in Montebello wear the same shoes as the Quebec policemen who arrest them!)
http://www.flickr.com/photos/emiliep/1206638928/

CBC Report at Montebello 2007

See the distinctive yellow dots on the thick corrugated soles of the boots which are the giveaway.

The Quebec Provincial Police were then forced after three days of public outrage to admit that these three men were indeed their officers operating undercover.

Fast Forward to the Toronto 2010 G20 Protest Riot
On Saturday June 26, 2010, the Globe and Mail published on their website a number of photographs taken at the afternoon riot in downtown Toronto precipitated by the ‘black bloc.’
Using these photos, I am going to show you that once again, the ‘black bloc’ provocateurs and the armoured police are wearing the exact same shoes.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/g20-day-of-protest/article1619712/ Thanks to the Globe and Mail for these very helpful photos.

Starbucks Vandalised Here an operative throws a metal chair through a Starbucks window. This man’s physique doesn’t look like a seedy ‘anarchist’ to me. Rather, this is the fit strong body of a trained soldier – somebody who puts in a lot of regular gym time. He is also wearing what is really a uniform and rather specialized equipment on his forearm and possibly his hip. Unfortunately in this picture we cannot see the shoes being worn. But we certainly can in the picture that follows, and this is where it gets interesting.

The Provocateurs’ Combat Boots Below another operative throws what appears to be a rock at another Starbucks window.

Take a close look at the upturned boot. This is a brand new (? recently issued) very distinctive deep black colour combat boot. Note as at Montebello, the special thick heavy corrugated soles plus what appears to be some reinforcement of the upper forefoot area.