Gulf oil spill recovery exec dead in plane crash

[janet118]

Source: Associated Press

DESTIN, Fla. – An executive helping to guide BP's recovery from the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, a top Texas lawyer and his mother-in-law were killed in a small plane crash in waters off northern Florida, officials said Wednesday.
James Patrick Black, 58, died about a mile from the Destin airport in the Florida Panhandle on Tuesday night, said BP spokeswoman Hejdi Feick. Those who knew them said the three were bound for a Thanksgiving holiday gathering in Florida.
Black was director of operations for BP's Gulf Coast Restoration Organization and had a key role guiding the business unit created after April's Deepwater Horizon rig fire and explosion and monthslong spill that spewed at least 200 millions of crude oil from a blown-out BP well.

Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_florida_plane_crash

---

Black was traveling with Texas solicitor general, Gregory Scott Coleman, 47, and Coleman's mother-in-law, Charlene Black Miller, 63. Coleman piloted the Piper Malibu. Crash was tentatively attributed to low visibility due to fog as plane was approaching Destin after a stop in New Orleans.

[unkachuck]

1. my wonderfully compassionate heart is bleeding....n/t

[villager]

2. an actual accident? Or was he about to testify somewhere?

n/t

[Recursion]

17. Small airplanes are dangerous

Not as dangerous as cars, but still.

[villager]

24. Particularly for liberal senators and people about to testify against Bush and Rove!

Kind of "skews the odds," it seems...

[Recursion]

26. Umm... Ted Stevens?

Or is it only suspicious when someone you agree with dies in a dangerous small airplane?

[villager]

27. that's like saying because there are car wrecks, there's nothing suspicious about Karen Silkwood's

"accident."

Which is exactly why that method is used.

[defendandprotect]

30. Right ... was wondering if he had already testified .... suspicious until ...???

[lovuian]

3. Texas solicitor general was traveling with BP exec

not good not good

[sofa king]

35. Yeah, what's up with that?

Edit: I see now. He's a former solicitor general,. That's what's up with that.

[Blandocyte]

4. It's like dying in a conspiracy theory when you go down in a small plane.

RIP

[FirstLight]

8. It's exactly too weird...

:tinfoilhat:

okay you can slap me now for thinking this could be related, but they are BOTH in the top 5 front page:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x4628561 ">US surrenders e-mails on Gulf oil leak estimates

:scared:

[notesdev]

5. BP oil spill incident commander dies in small plane crash

Source: The Times-Picayune

Jim Black, a BP incident commander for the company's Gulf of Mexico oil spill response team, died in a small plane crash near Destin, Fla., on Tuesday night, the company confirmed.


... (snip!)


The Coast Guard said the small plane crashed Tuesday about 7:30 p.m. in Choctawhatchee Bay.

Black, whose job at the oil giant was director of operations for the Gulf Coast Restoration Organization, spent a lot of his time during the past several months in and around New Orleans. His work as incident commander for the oil spill response took him to the Joint Incident Command Center in Robert, to another operations center in Houma and often to New Orleans.

... (snip!)



Read more: http://www.nola.com/news/gulf-oil-spill/index.ssf/2010/11/bp_oil_spill_incident_commande.html

---

Hmmmm

[Blandocyte]

6. RIP. Dang. It's like dying in a conspiracy theory, going down in a small plane

[SpiralHawk]

14. Dead men tell no tales

[dixiegrrrrl]

28. Was he fixing to testify about the spill?

[somone]

7. Prominent Conservative Litigator Dies in Plane Crash

http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2010/11/24/prominent-conservative-litigator-dies-in-plane-crash/

Prominent Conservative Litigator Dies in Plane Crash
By Jess Bravin

Some very sad news. Gregory Coleman, a former Texas solicitor general and prominent litigator for conservative causes, died Tuesday when the small plane he was piloting crashed in Florida, the industry publication Texas Lawyer reported. Mr. Coleman, a partner in the Austin, Texas, law firm Yetter Coleman, was 47 years old. Two passengers also died in the crash, authorities said.

After clerking for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, Mr. Coleman was hired by then-Texas Attorney General John Cornyn, now a U.S. senator, as solicitor general, the state’s top litigator. In private practice, Mr. Coleman’s best known case came last year, when he represented a Texas utility district challenging provisions of the 1965 Voting Rights Act. At the Supreme Court, Mr. Coleman argued that provisions requiring state and local governments that once discriminated against minorities to clear voting changes with the Justice Department were unconstitutional.

In what was widely viewed as a compromise outcome among the court’s conservative and liberal wings, the justices read the Voting Rights Act in a novel way that exempted Mr. Coleman’s client from the preclearance requirement. The justices voted 8-1 to leave the statute otherwise intact, for now. But they suggested that it might not survive a future challenge unless Congress significantly revised its provisions.

Mr. Coleman was back at the Supreme Court earlier this year, representing a Texas prosecutor who sought to withhold DNA evidence from a death-row inmate who claimed it could exonerate him. “In all that he did, Greg exemplified the highest values of our profession - an abiding sense of decency and fair play, a strong belief in public service, and a tireless dedication to his clients and professional colleagues,” his law firm wrote on its website.

[Poll_Blind]

9. It's the small prop planes that get ya. It almost never is the corporate jets.

At least it seems like that. I don't mean the commercial puddle jumpers, those things are built like brick shitters. It's the little non-commercial prop planes. Wellstone was in one, IIRC. Sick, can't think of more at the moment.

PB

[TheWraith]

15. Those little prop planes fly lower, typically through worse weather, and have less margin for error.

Larger and more powerful jets tend to have higher operating ceilings, better instrumentation, and more restrictions on what they're allowed to do. Also better maintenance. Consequently, a disproportionate number of accidents involve small aircraft--usually from suffering mechanical failure, or crashing in bad weather.

[CanonRay]

19. Also more inexperienced pilots using bad judgement

why didn't he know he was flying into fog?

[defendandprotect]

33. Notice that we have poorly paid and less "experienced" pilots flying commerial jets ...

these days --

the WWII and VN pilots are long gone -- and airlines want a cheap pilot.

Military is looking to solar planes -- time for the commercial airlines to

do the same.

[defendandprotect]

32. Many of the planes that have gone done were substanital with all kinds of warning systems....

as was Wellstone's -- and though cover story on that one was bad weather

that wasn't true.

[Generic Other]

10. Did they recover his remains? Were they oil soaked?

Sorry. I can't summon up much sympathy try as I might. I have as much to spare for him as he has had for the suffering of all the people in the Gulf area who were negatively impacted by the company who signed his paychecks.

[bryanccfshr]

11. Dancing on graves is classless

I can't express the sympathy I have for this individual. To have such shallow hate and express it on a forum publicly, and to assume that this would be supported from all readers.

I find all comments wishing no true thoughts of sympathy to relatives and loved ones of those affected disturbing. The gulf spill was not the worst thing to happen this year, it was the most public thing but not the worst.

As this man was heading to meet family for thanksgiving he met an untimely end.
Who is anyone to judge someone by their employer?

How many federal employees roam this post? Should we be mean when they pass if they worked for the government during the Bush administration and many here did not agree with that administrations Acton's? Hey they chose to stay employed so they are as evil as what you hated about the government at the time?

I find those who think someone who would take on such a difficult position to be commendable and of great character. But perhaps this former Marine puts to much emphasis on actions rather than broad speculation and hate towards specific groups to understand how this thread is trending.

Since I didn't jump on the hate bandwagon over an innocent parties death I expect by this trend in HP poor behavior to also be berated, belittled and my death celebrated sarcasticly.

[Name removed]

12. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Generic Other]

13. Why are federal employees vacationing with BP executives?

Do you know what collusion means? "Collusion is an agreement between two or more persons, sometimes illegal and therefore secretive, to deceive, mislead, or defraud others of their legal rights" It can involve "price fixing, kickbacks, or misrepresenting the independence of the relationship between the colluding parties." In legal terms, all acts effected by collusion are considered void.

I believe the government has colluded with BP to underplay the extent of the catastrophe in the Gulf for the sole purpose of defrauding the people of the Gulf region. And reading that a government employee and a BP executive of 32 years went on a junket together does nothing to calm my concerns. It merely makes me angrier. There are no innocent parties on that plane. The innocent parties are fishermen and their families, small businesses, the citizens of 4 states who must live with the aftermath of this spill.

Why is it that the feds have decided that "Tuesday was the end of the three-month period to file an emergency claims application with Gulf Coast Restoration Organization, the firm selected by BP and President Barack Obama to administer $20 billion set aside by the oil giant to pay damages"?
http://www.nola.com/news/gulf-oil-spill/index.ssf/2010/11/new_gulf_oil_spill_claim_rules.html#incart_hbx

Why have they only spent $2 billion of that money when there is evidence of massive contamination in the Gulf as well as evidence of
a pattern of lies and cover-ups by both the federal government and BP?

Why are reported illnesses among people living along the Gulf coast ignored by the government and covered up?
Why is there no real testing or scientific investigation of the impact of the spill being conducted by EPA or NOAA?
Why are clean-up efforts largely cosmetic when significant amounts of oil and corexit still pollute the Gulf?
Why are bankrupt businesses, Gulf fishermen, homeowners being asked to sign waivers agreeing not to sue BP if they receive any settlement monies no matter how insignificant?
What happens to the remaining $18 billion dollars BP pledged to spend to restore the Gulf?
Have politicians been paid off by powerful BP lobbyests to downplay problems?

And again, given the shady nature of the situation, why with so many questions unanswered are government officials taking vacations with BP executives?
And why aren't BP executives in jail rather than flying off with government officials on Florida beach holidays?
Dirty dealings all around.

As I said, I am having a hard time mustering sympathy for those I think are guilty. But I am a strong believer in karma.

If the Gulf is a grave, I am not the one dancing on it.

[TheWraith]

16. What the fuck are you talking about, a federal employee?

The other guy killed in the crash was the FORMER Solicitor General of TEXAS. Someone who had nothing to do with the federal government, ever, and certainly not in recent years.

[Generic Other]

22. I am sorry I was mistaken...he's a "former" state employee

I was reacting to the previous post about federal employees being upset by my lack of sympathy for a BP exec's death. My questions still apply. Current, former, federal, state, municipal, whatever...vacationing with BP employees raises questions for me.

Perhaps Congressman Joe Barton can post on this thread next demanding I apologize to all government employeees, former and current who lobby for or benefit from the oil industry, as well as all oil execs who die after hammering out deals with the government ripping off citizens.

Maybe I should apologize to Tony Hayward too since I am so out of line.

[Recursion]

18. You realize there was not a Federal employee there, right?

There was the executive of a company BP hired to help manage the crisis, and a Texas state employee.

EDIT: Belay, I read that wrong. The exec did work directly for BP. Carry on.

[BrklynLiberal]

21. Lots of excellent questions...and not one meaningful answer....anywhere.

and I do share your schadenfreude...

[qanda]

20. I agree completely with you

I have always said that there is no gain in rejoicing in someone else's pain. The best thing to do if you have nothing nice to say is to say nothing. Welcome to DU!

[Generic Other]

23. Failing to muster sympathy is not exactly rejoicing

Sorry if I offended you. I have been angry over the actions of BP for months. This BP exec is directly tied to a front company denying citizens the right to collect for future damages related to the oil spill. Along with the federal government, his "company" was involved in hammering out an agreement that gives BP the upper hand.

"Tuesday was the end of the three-month period to file an emergency claims application with...Gulf Coast Claims Facility. The firm was selected by BP and President Barack Obama to administer $20 billion set aside by the oil giant to pay damages; thus far, it has paid 125,000 claimants nearly $2 billion.

Those emergency payments have had no strings attached. Claimants have been able to collect the money without having to sign away their right to sue BP and other responsible parties in court..."

Now they must sign waivers promising to settle, never to sue to get any money from BP. Yet the Gulf is not cleaned up. People are still getting sick. Businesses are bankrupt. Property values have plummeted. There have been massive cover-ups, lies, dirty deals struck. 7 months of lies from scoundrels, and now they are ready to close the books.

No, I don't have much sympathy to spare for BP execs involved in these shady deals.

http://www.nola.com/news/gulf-oil-spill/index.ssf/2010/11/new_gulf_oil_spill_claim_rules.html#incart_hbx

[sgsmith]

25. A little more information from the local paper

http://www.nwfdailynews.com/news/destin-35175-disappears-landing.html

Eltcher said at the briefing that Coleman took off from Destin on Tuesday, flew to Lakefront Airport in New Orleans and flew back to Destin. Eltcher said he believes the plane last fueled in Destin, but was checking with the airport in New Orleans.

When Coleman was making his final approach to Destin Airport, his Piper Malibu plane dropped off the radar earlier than expected, Eltcher said. At the time, a dense fog advisory was in effect and visibility was limited to a quarter mile. A solid cloud layer was only 100 feet above the ground.
...
"I heard a low-flying plane, then a bang. When we went to see what it was, it was too foggy to see anything and we didn't think anything of it," said Drew Smith.

"It's not weird to hear a low-flying plane but it is odd to hear it stop suddenly," added his sister Kalen Smith.

[Name removed]

29. Deleted message

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[Haole Girl]

31. Welcome to du

If this upsets you, don't venture into GD.

[Name removed]

34. Deleted message

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