Friday, April 30, 2010

POND, OIL, GULF COAST!

Many that have followed this blog for any time have seen countless pictures of the "Pond", 50 feet down the dirt road from the house. This is where my Snakes, Spiders,  virtually all my Nature Pics are taken. This is now completely flooded. At one time this past summer it almost went completely dry. This area is not a Natural Pond, is is merely an area where people dug out sand to be hauled off as fill dirt for many many years, and now fills with water. A Man-Made Mosquito pit-but beautiful 99% of the time! It is maybe 3-4 feet deep at it's deepest point!


This is never underwater. You can walk on dry land, well past these trees, easily for 30 yards and it will still only be swampy.

This is a picture of how the "Pond" usually looks this time of year. It was an incredibly wet winter, but we are already in a deficit since January for this year! The Trees you see in the water on the picture above- are all the way across the pond, on the far left hand side. You can barely see a slight depression in the middle, left, that is holding only a foot or so of water. There is now water in the spot where I am standing when I took this picture last Summer!


NOW PLEASE LOOK AT THE PICS BELOW...... 
 BEAUTIFUL AREN'T THEY?

Any guess as to what it is?

If you guessed Gas/Oil on water, you are correct. In one area of the pond when it went almost completely dry, in a beautiful patch of mud and water, complete with Tadpoles and life; this sprang up out of the ground! I can only guess that it is, a BUBBLING CRUDE, BLACK GOLD, TEXAS TEA.....

The only problem is, is that it was man made! Garbage, dumped...probably where someone changed their oil at one time, or threw out an old oil filter! Who knows what is under there? I wish I could find them and make them DRINK IT!!!!

OK,  John, what's the point? The point is:

This is about a, 2 foot by 4 foot wide area. Everything around it is stone cold dead now! Not even a weed is growing there! That's the point. Now picture the Gulf Coast of Louisiana, and multiply the above by a Thousand if not Hundreds of thosands times!
Now let's compare it to the "Small"

OIL SPILL:   reported by BP "at first" which was oh--only about 1,000 barrels a day--and is now purported to be about 5,000 barrels and growing! Now it threatens the livelihood of thousands of people and an entire areas' economy! It is supposed to hit land in Louisiana tonight!


I too am very concerned about this massive leak and have no ready answers. I do know we have been operating rigs safely, for many years without any major disasters, and am surprised it took this long for something to happen. But if we quit every time we met adversity, or suffered a set back we still wouldn't have wheels.


What is/are the answer(s)?
What are the right questions?
What are your concerns?
What recourse's do we have, and which way do we turn now?
2012, Fact, Fiction, or just being fueled (pun intended) by recent world events?


I don't have the answers or solutions: I only wrote what questions I had on my mind, and documented what I saw first hand, on a minuscule scale in my own little world! After all- this is MY BLOG- where I express myself.

One thing I do know for sure: We will clean up this mess, learn from it, and perservere.

Why: Because we are AMERICAN'S, and that's what we do!!  Arrogant- Yes,  Cocky- Absolutely! 

BUT AM I RIGHT?   


JMc


12 comments:

  1. I've heard they're not ministering to animals covered with oil in that spill. So sad.

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  2. This is terrible. We only know what we hear on the news and they are comparing it to the Exxon Valdez oil spill, we heard about it on Tuesday where 11 people were missing, and still are.
    Yes, what price oil?.....and who pays for it?
    Just heard that a big hurricane is about to hit the Gulf of Mexico too!

    VBHFATP!

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  3. I was always captivated by gas/oil spills on the lake when I was young - even when I came up in the middle of one after diving in and smelled of petroleum - that smell ALWAYS takes me back to those carefree days of endless summer.

    But the reality is that stuff just isn't good even if it makes pretty swirlies. I'm sure there will be environmental groups out to help - and the Dawn people donating dish detergent. Maybe they should just spill a load of Dawn in the water. Or get a giant roll of Bounty - the quicker picker upper. Not to make light of it but they really do need to come up with a solution because we as a planet can't afford these kinds of disasters.

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  4. We'll clean it up, yes. Will we ever learn to stop saying "that won't happen" and prepare a plan for the day it does? Accidents happen...but why is it STILL spilling?

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  5. blueviolet,

    Now that is just a SIN! That is wrong on soo many levels!

    John


    Alice,

    What price oil indeed? I should have left up the rest of the rant!! But I decided to take it down--FOR NOW!!

    I need to check up on the Hurricane--hey--maybe it will help? Like churn up the water, it seems I read something about that somewhere....

    anyway--

    VBHFAT Oily P! back to U!!!!

    John



    Jeannie,

    UGH, I can't imagine coming up in an oil slick! Eww--the smell alone!!!!

    J



    Jen,

    That's what scares me..they are talking weeks and maybe months for a solution! I mean "DUH of the day"--but this could be REALLY bad!!!!

    Jen, sadly it'll be the Head back in the sand approach again.....until next time... Hmmmm...should we continue to go Nuclear???

    John

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  6. my heart aches over this, but i share your zest




    Aloha from Hawaii


    Comfort Spiral

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  7. Cloudia,

    Amen & Thanks! I needed you positive and inspiring words today to offset this!

    John

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  8. Nice post--I like the way you drew us into your pond and then the "oil slick" and the analogy to the Gulf Coast. It's a shame and we need to develop a better energy policy that allows us to you way less crude

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  9. This is going on to a degree in every industrialized nation...

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  10. Sage,

    TYVM--It just struck me how small MY little spill was vs. the scope of the one in the Gulf!

    I think we have the answer right under our Blue Ridge Mountains!

    Buffalo-- imagine when all the third worlders get cranked up and we send the pollutants "Over there" w/o regulations so they can produce CHEAPER!!

    How much is/cam Mother Earth clean up after we trash Her?

    J

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  11. Yeah, that oil spill is ONE MELL OF A HESS !

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  12. Heff,

    Sickening--but I can't believe it hasn't happened before! We must be doing a lot right!

    J

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Incredibly smart relies: