All Aboard Boats: Oceans Afire

The Coast Guard began a controlled burn of the oil slick in the Gulf of Mexico today, April 28, 2010, that resulted from the fire, explosion and subsequent sinking of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig last week. According to officials, booms will consolidate oil into several-thousand-gallon batches, which will be burned for an estimated hour each.

The leak caused by the incident is said to be releasing 42,000 gallons per day, so the effect of burning “several thousand gallons” at a time raises a question for me: Is this a feel-good effort to appease the public? Or, is it a genuinely good way to prevent prime fishing grounds from being affected? There’s still no word on how the leak can be stopped.

Read the full report here. http://coastguardnews.com/controlled-burn-of-deepwater-horizon-oil-spill/2010/04/28/

This video, showing firefighting efforts on the ill-fated rig, gives a glimpse of what burning oil looks like: (Video courtesy U.S. Coast Guard)