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BP's live video stream of oil gushing into the Gulf of Mexico is simultaneously tragic and hypnotic. With each passing second, more gallons of crude oil and natural gas escape into the ocean. Until Thursday, BP and NOAA had stood by their early estimate -- produced April 29, a week after the Deepwater Horizon rig sank -- that about 5,000 barrels (210,000 gallons) were leaking per day from the damaged well, although they had acknowledged that the estimate was not precise. And after the world first witnessed the 30-second video clip that BP released on May 12, scientists began to wonder more loudly how the estimate could be that low. Now, thanks in part to congressional pressure, we have a way to watch the environmental crisis unfold in real time via a live video feed. We modified our original Gulf Leak Meter because the video takes our sliding scale out of the abstract and into reality. Stories of hurricane winds and rain lashing the coasts of Florida, Louisiana and other southeastern states pop up in the news constantly during the summer, but warnings of Pacific storms such as Jimena are few and far between.In fact, only one hurricane is thought to have ever struck California, and that was clear back in 1858. Could it happen again? Not impossible, but also extremely unlikely in any given year. The disparity is a result of the oceanic and atmospheric conditions at play in both basins, which send hurricanes in the Atlantic toward land and hurricanes in the Pacific away from it, generally sparing West Coasters from the rages of these storms. The hurricanes that swirl over both oceans form through the same mechanism, whereby warm ocean waters fuel the rotating storms. (Typhoons are also the same phenomenon; the name is simply the designation used in the western Pacific and Indian Oceans.)
Our first
oil widget, which we released May 9 and continue to update, allows readers
to choose scenarios based on the best guesses (because that is truly what
they were) of the spill's size. On May 14, we spoke with some outside
experts for more perspectives on how much oil might be flowing from
the leak. And on May 17, we
factored in that BP was reporting some success in siphoning 2,000 barrels
of oil per day out of the leaking well.
Here's a look at some of the other numbers that form the basis of our
oil leak range, including our update
on May 21 about reports of a new estimate on the way:
A new "flow rate technical team" comprised of outside experts and multiple
government agencies is beginning work on a new estimate of the leak's magnitude,
which could come as early as this weekend. We'll update both our widgets
until the leak is stopped.
Wire
services reported Friday evening
that the White House plans to name former Florida Sen. Bob Graham and former
EPA administrator William K. Reilly to lead the presidential commission
investigating the oil leak. |
