UPDATE x5: Dam *NOT* breached?? Tony the Tiger still dead.

by Brainwrap

This is bad. Really, really bad:

A Michigan State Police emergency management official said this evening that the viscous flow of oil has breached the Morrow Dam and is bearing down on a federally designated pollution zone on the Kalamazoo River, potentially adding to the cost of the disaster's cleanup.

Tom Sands, the deputy state director of emergency management and homeland security for the Michigan State Police, said he saw a light sheen of oil past the Morrow Dam near Galesburg during a flyover this afternoon.

That would mean that the oil is closer to a Superfund site, an Environmental Protection Agency designation for heavily polluted areas. And Gov. Jennifer Granholm, who spoke to reporters tonight along with Sands, said the presence of oil at a Superfund site "completely explodes the amount of money needed to address" the spill.

continued at Daily Kos...

[Update x4] MASSIVE Oil Spill in Battle Creek threatens Lake Michigan

by Brainwrap

I've been watching the diaries all day and aside from my own (which, admittedly, underplayed the seriousness of the situation), I haven't seen much attention paid to the latest massive petroleum-based environmental disaster:

(quick update: actually, DingellDem posted about it earlier today but it didn't make the Rec list, which it absolutely should--this is HUGE, especially on top of the Deepwater Horizon mess, of course)

continued at Daily Kos...

A Sickening in the Gulf Stream

by Bob Higgins

[Editor's note: This began as a comment this morning to "Oil spill: The nightmare becomes reality" a Carl Hiaasen piece on the arrival of BP's poisonous gusher of crud on the shores of Pensacola.]

Originally posted at my site Bob Higgins

Carl,

You're right; it is difficult for people living far from our coasts to feel the horrible weight of this disaster.

I live in Ohio but have lived on the coasts of California and North Carolina. I have also lived through and helped clean up an oil spill near San Francisco in 1970 or thereabouts. I have friends and family though who have never seen or at least never lived near the sea and had it become, as seems inevitable to me, a part of them.

continued at Daily Kos....

BP still working -- to avoid liability. Now it's sick workers.

by 8ackgr0und N015e

As I pointed out before, BP has been working hard to keep down the estimated size of the spill to minimize their liability.  You might say that one datapoint doesn't make a pattern.  Well, here's a second one.   Fishermen working to clean the spill are starting to show up in local hospitals with respiratory complaints.  Why? BP is not providing them with respirators.   According to Clint Guidry, president of the Louisiana Shrimp Association (interviewed on Democracy Now): It is a question of liability. The minute BP declares that there is a respiratory danger on the situation is the day that they let the door open for liability suits down the line. If they could have gotten away with covering this up, like they did in Alaska Valdez situation, like Exxon, they would not have to pay a penny for any kind of health-related claims.... Don't tell me "no one could have predicted this."

continued at Daily Kos....