Oil Spill

On a recent airplane flight, I realized a way I'm different from other people. The men in the seats behind me spent the entire three hours talking about their ideas to stop the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Me, I'm not smart enough to stop the oil spill. But before we go further, let me be clear. I'm sad about the oil spill, and I'm furious about it, and I don't think it's a laughing matter. I'm not making fun of it. Honestly, I spend a lot of time thinking about how awful it is, and I read everything I can, because I'm interested.

Two years after the Exxon Valdez ran aground and caused the nation's worst oil spill, crews are preparing for what they hope will be the final season of cleanup work along Alaska's still-soiled shoreline. Exxon has contended that Alaska's shores are clean, but an unknown number of miles of shoreline remain soiled, and in some places black goo continues to seep back into the water. To find out how serious the problem still is, survey crews have targeted for inspection next month 575 miles of "problem" shoreline that various agencies identified over the winter.

Under pressure from the state of Alaska, the Bush administration moved yesterday to assume more control over the massive Alaskan oil-spill cleanup, increasing Coast Guard authority in the effort and preparing to dispatch soldiers to cleanse beaches and wildlife. The new Coast Guard role, disclosed by Commandant Adm. Paul A. Yost Jr., will allow the guard essentially to direct the cleanup but leaves Exxon Corp. nominally in charge of the operation and responsible for the $1 million-a-day costs.

Oil-spill cleanup yields treasures CAMINADA HEADLAND, La. - Cleanup after the BP oil spill has turned up dozens of sites where archaeologists are finding human and animal bones, pottery, and primitive weapons left behind by prehistoric Indian settlements - a trove of new clues about the Gulf Coast's mound dwellers more than 1,300 years ago. But experts also fear the remains could be damaged by oil or lost to erosion before they can be fully studied....

So far, the likelihood of any oil from the Deepwater Horizon spill in the Gulf of Mexico reaching New Jersey's shores is remote. But the state isn't taking any chances. On Tuesday, Department of Environmental Protection Commissioner Bob Martin announced the formation of a "gulf spill team" to monitor the situation daily, create a scientific model of how the oil could reach New Jersey, and, in case it does, develop a plan of action. The move was met with both praise from environmental groups that fear the worst and derision from a critic who said that given the agency's limited funds and staff, it had far more important environmental matters to tend to. "Right now, we are optimistic the oil will not reach New Jersey and will not affect fishing nor the summer beach season," Martin said in a prepared statement.

So far, the likelihood of any oil from the Deepwater Horizon spill in the Gulf of Mexico reaching New Jersey's shores is remote. But the state isn't taking any chances. On Tuesday, Department of Environmental Protection Commissioner Bob Martin announced the formation of a "gulf spill team" to monitor the situation daily, create a scientific model of how the oil could reach New Jersey, and, in case it does, develop a plan of action. The move was met with both praise from environmental groups that fear the worst and derision from a critic who said that given the agency's limited funds and staff, it had far more important environmental matters to tend to. "Right now, we are optimistic the oil will not reach New Jersey and will not affect fishing nor the summer beach season," Martin said in a prepared statement.

Saudi Arabian crews moved plastic curtains into the water to shield desalination plants from the massive oil slick rolling over the Persian Gulf. Although Saudi officials said yesterday that their drinking water would be safe, more than a few unknowns made that a murky assessment. "We don't yet know what (Iraqi President) Saddam Hussein will do next," said Richard Golob, a Boston-based oil spill consultant. "This is just one of several environmental cards in his deck. " In order to stem the flow, the allies yesterday bombed Kuwaiti oil taps allegedly opened by Iraq.

Coast Guard officials today were hoping to limit the damage caused by the spill yesterday of more than 200,000 gallons of crude oil into the Delaware River near Paulsboro, N.J. The spill was discovered at about 2:40 p.m. when a leak was found in a tanker docked at the Mobil Oil Co. refinery across from Philadelphia. Officials called it a major spill, but its immediate impact wasn't known. "The (containment) booms have been set around the vessel and the spill has been contained," said Coast Guard Petty Officer Randy Midgett.

A Soviet oil-skimming ship sent with great fanfare to help contain the Alaskan oil spill has been beaten back by stormy seas and slowed by its own technical shortcomings, the U.S. Coast Guard said yesterday. "To date, it's not been very successful," Coast Guard Capt. Glen Haines told a public meeting on Exxon Corp.'s progress in handling the worst oil spill in U.S. history. In four days, the 435-foot Vaydagubski, the world's largest oil-skimming vessel, has managed to collect only a small amount of oil. Haines said that the ship was unable to pump aboard what little oil it did round up with floating booms and that Coast Guard vessels had to draw off that oil instead.

The catastrophic oil spill that is still unfolding in the Gulf of Mexico must not be repeated anywhere near the shores of New Jersey and Delaware. Since the blowout at a BP deep-drilling rig on April 20, more than four million gallons of oil has spilled. By comparison, the Exxon Valdez accident in Alaska in 1989 spilled almost 11 million gallons. The accident has fouled gulf waters, threatened beaches, and imperiled the fishing industry. Eleven workers lost their lives. Three weeks after the explosion, the leaking undersea well continues to gush 220,000 gallons of crude per day. BP officials say they hope to contain the leak within a few weeks.

The wonder of Brian Dickerson's recent rugged 3-D paintings on wood in his solo "Constructed Paintings and Drawings from Ballinglen" at Seraphin Gallery is the immediate sense of quiet and mystery they impart. While he was, of course, informed by the remote, artist-friendly locale in northwest County Mayo, Ireland, which he expects to visit again next fall, Dickerson's original inspiration was the excavation of an Owasco Indian settlement he watched at age 13 near his childhood home in upstate New York - the colors of the layered soil, the wooden grids, the hidden artifacts.

NEW ORLEANS - A federal judge in New Orleans said Wednesday that he is leaning in favor of granting preliminary approval to a proposed class-action settlement that would resolve billions of dollars in claims against BP over the 2010 oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. After hearing BP and a team of plaintiffs' attorneys outline the proposed deal, U.S. District Judge Carl Barbier said he plans to rule within a week. Barbier would hold a "fairness hearing" later this year, possibly in November, before deciding whether to give his final approval.

NEW ORLEANS - A BP engineer intentionally deleted more than 300 text messages that said the company's efforts to control the Gulf of Mexico oil spill were failing and that the amount of oil leaking was far more than what the company reported, the Justice Department said Tuesday. In the first criminal charges related to the deadly explosion on the Deepwater Horizon rig in April 2010, the Justice Department arrested Kurt Mix and charged him with two counts of obstruction of justice for allegedly destroying evidence sought by federal authorities, officials announced in a statement.

Need civil discussion on climate Amid the questionable reasoning and unhelpful sarcasm in Charles Krauthammer's commentary "Here's seaweed in your tank" (Monday), it is disturbing to find not even a passing reference to the consequences of our fossil-fuel consumption. I don't know whether Krauthammer thinks he knows better than the overwhelming majority of the world's climate scientists or whether he thinks we need not be concerned about the world we leave our descendants. If conservatives showed any interest in conserving the only ecosystem we have evolved to inhabit, or, if you prefer, that God created for us, then perhaps we could have the kind of civil discussion needed to make the hard decisions.

12 officers held in shooting death Venezuela has detained 12 policemen for investigation in the killing of the daughter of the Chilean consul in the western city of Maracaibo, according to a statement from the attorney general's office. Karen Berendique, 19, was being driven to a birthday party five blocks from home early Saturday by her older brother when police at a checkpoint pointed guns at the car, her father, Fernando Berendique, said. When his son panicked, police shot at the car six times, he said.

NEW ORLEANS - BP and a committee representing plaintiffs suing over the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill have reached an agreement, a federal judge said late Friday night. As a result of the agreement that will be filed with the court for approval, the trial that was scheduled to begin Monday has been postponed a second time, Judge Carl Barbier said. No new date was immediately set. The settlement will likely result in a realignment of the parties in this litigation and require substantial changes to the current trial plan, Barbier said.

BP Plc, operator of the Macondo well that caused the worst oil spill in the United States, may reach a settlement for the disaster this week after a partner agreed on fines, an Oppenheimer & Co. analyst said. Mitsui & Co.'s MOEX Offshore 2007 L.L.C. will pay $90 million to the United States and five states to settle pollution violations related to 2010 spill. While BP will probably have to accept different terms as the operator, the settlement suggests that BP would pay $585 million for violations, less than 20 percent of what the company has provisioned, said Fadel Gheit, an analyst at Oppenheimer in New York.

NEW ORLEANS - A minority partner in BP's blown-out well in the Gulf of Mexico agreed Friday to pay $90 million in a settlement with the federal government and gulf states over the 2010 oil spill. It includes the largest civil penalty ever recovered under the federal Clean Water Act. MOEX Offshore 2007 L.L.C. owned 10 percent interest in the Macondo well, about 50 miles off the Louisiana coast. The well blew out in April 2010, destroying the BP-leased rig Deepwater Horizon, killing 11 men and resulting in the nation's worst offshore oil spill.

Diesel fuel from an underground supply line at a NJ Transit bus depot tainted about four miles of waterway in Washington and Gloucester Townships before emergency crews contained it Thursday. Roughly 26,000 gallons of diesel fuel from the ruptured underground line seeped into a storm drain and a stream leading to Grenloch Lake, which is in Washington Township and Gloucester Township, and into Blackwood Lake in Gloucester Township, said Lawrence Hajna, a spokesman with the state Department of Environmental Protection.

JOE FRAZIER leaned forward and picked a cherry from the bowl that sat on the dining-room table at the place he had on the 20th floor of a downtown hotel. Somehow, we had gotten on the subject of his old R&B band, "Smokin' Joe and The Knockouts. " In occasional gigs back in the 1970s, Joe was the lead vocalist of the group, and even had a contract with Capitol Records. The "Knockouts" never caught on, but the songbird in Joe was always apt to soar with unbidden spontaneity, as it did that day we met in his apartment in June 2009.