Rolling Stone: NOAA video shows govt knew about plumes & "horrific scope" of spill "within hours"

[highplainsdem]

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/17390/111965

Within hours, the government assembled a response team at the "war room" of the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration in Seattle. The scene, captured by a NOAA cameraman and briefly posted on the agency's website, provides remarkable insight into the government's engagement during the earliest hours of the catastrophe, and, more troubling, the role of top administration figures in downplaying its horrific scope.

At a conference table, nearly a dozen scientists gather around a map of the Gulf. Joshua Slater, a commissioned NOAA officer dressed in his uniform, runs the show. "So far we've created a trajectory that was passed up the chain of command to the Coast Guard and eventually to the president showing where the oil might go," he tells the assembled team. BP's remote operated sub, he adds, "was unsuccessful in activating the blowout preventers, so we're gearing up right now."

An NOAA expert on oil disasters jumps in: "I think we need to be prepared for it to be the spill of the decade."

Written on a whiteboard at the front of the room is the government's initial, worst-case estimate of the size of the spill. While the figure is dramatically higher than any official estimate issued by BP or the government, it is in line with the high-end calculations by scientists who have monitored the spill.

"Estm: 64k - 110k bbls/Day." The equivalent of up to three Exxon Valdez spills gushing into the Gulf of Mexico every week.

Damningly, the whiteboard also documents the disconnect between what the government suspected to be the magnitude of the disaster and the far lower estimates it was feeding to the public. Written below the federal estimate are the words, "300,000 gal/day reported on CNN." Appearing on the network that same day on a video feed from the Gulf, Coast Guard Rear Adm. Mary Landry insisted that the government had no figure. "We do not have an estimate of the amount of crude emanating from the wellhead," she said.

Later in the video, a voice on speakerphone with a heavy Southern accent reveals that government scientists were concerned from the very beginning about underwater plumes of oil – a reality that NOAA administrator Jane Lubchenco and BP executives are still seeking to downplay. "They weren't sure how that oil was going to react once it was spilled," the voice says. "Whether it was going to rise, or form layers and start twisting around." The government, in short, knew from the start that surface measurements of the oil slick – on which it would premise its absurdly low estimate of 5,000 barrels a day – were likely to be unreliable.

[Vinnie From Indy]

1. It is laughable that "nobody" could have forseen what might hapen and

what WAS happening within hours of the start of this disaster.

It also seems that there were voices in the Admin. that successfully argued that the President should not immediately "take charge" of the disaster.

[pnwmom]

5. What would have been differently if the government had taken charge?

Given that the government has no experience or expertise in fixing this kind of disaster?

[dgibby]

8. There is nothing the Govt could have done about the leak,

but there was a lot that could and should have been done much sooner to mitigate the effects of the spill. Considering that they had this info from the beginning, the Govt's failure on this is even MORE appalling.

[Lorien]

14. Yes they could have; they could have accepted the help from other Nations that

was offered early on. Several Nations, including Denmark and the UAE, offered both expertise and equipment (since we claim to have neither). Saying "the government could do nothing" is just more corporate propaganda to reinforce the notion that government is useless and corporations are the only ones with answers. That doesn't fly in other Nations who drill offshore.

[dgibby]

17. I was referring to the actual leak.

I wasn't aware that any technology existed to cap the well, so wasn't considering it in my reply.

My biggest problem with this, aside from the fact that we ever allowed deep water drilling in the first place, is the miserable failure of the Govt to
respond to this like the major disaster it is.

In light of the fact that the Admin knew how bad this was from the beginning, the clean up and containment efforts have been pathetic.

I agree we should have accepted help immediately, but we're much too arrogant as a Nation to admit we can't take care of our own problems.

[Fumesucker]

2. Hoocoodanode?

That the government would lie about an environmental disaster?

Well, pretty much anyone who lived through the aftermath of 9/11/2001 and the lies about air quality at the WTC site..

[Beam Me Up]

4. Yep. Among many other things at that site. n/t

:thumbsup:

[Zoeisright]

3. And what exactly where they supposed to do about it?

This is the fault of repukes, and it's about damn time that someone said that. This is what happens when government is crippled. This is what happens when government doesn't regulate business. And this is what happens when 30 years of repuke rule destroys government.

[pnwmom]

6. Excellent question. Clearly the administration was acting from the beginning.

How would they have helped the situation by immediately coming out with dire predictions?

[annabanana]

10. How about not tasking the Coast Guard to do PR for BP. .

That would have been nice.

[highplainsdem]

12. +1

[readmoreoften]

7. How about not lie and downplay the extent of damage for BP?

Sure the GOP is also at fault, but it's not like Obama wasn't a friend of big oil.

[Raster]

11. I am more than a bit weary of the "what exactly could the Obama Administration have done" crowd.

The Obama Administration could have:
1. Immediately informed the world--because this will end up affecting the planet--the severity of the situation. This was NOT done.
2. Since the Big O Admin had some idea of the severity from the beginning, "last resort" containment and infrastructure should have immediately been moved into play by the Administration. Big O has taken the pathway of allowing BP to "manage":rofl: the situation. Yes, they have the underwater equipment, and yes they have the expertise:rofl: to deal with a situation of this type, but what they did not exhibit is the all-out effort to protect the American coastline and sensitive marine environment. And the Big O Administration did not force the issue. Talk is cheap.
3. There had been a deliberate effort by the Big O Administration to mitigate the evidence of this disaster and even limit the access to reporters and others wanting to relay factual information to the world. You can assign all the phoney altruistic rationalizations to these actions that you choose, the fact-of-the-matter is that the Obama Administration has allowed--even assisted--BP in limiting information about the actual severity and the appalling damage to the marine ecology.

[dgibby]

15. Dupe.

self-delete

[dgibby]

16. Thank you!

Well said. That question has been asked ad nausum and always by the same group. I find it telling that the people who ask generally never respond to the answer. It makes me question the motivation behind why the question was asked in the first place.

Obviously the Govt knew from the beginning that this was a five alarm fire, and they chose to fight it with a garden hose.

[frylock]

13. this is about the cover-up..

and last i checked, repubs aren't in the white house as of this posting.

[KharmaTrain]

9. How "Deregulation" Works...

When a problem occurs there's no back-ups, no watchdogs...it's full speed profits ahead. When the shit hits the fan...be it a major blow out in the Gulf or in the corporate boardroom, the corporates aren't prepared for the "what if"...and will do all they can to save their profits and asses while the company burns.

The lack of oversight has come home to roost...especially now that we have so many multinationals that have zero allegiance to any one country...only to the almighty dollar or euro. They spent billions in buying the influence and now when something has gone wrong, they're going to spend billions again to make their problems go away.

This administration is stuck in a damned if you do situation as we all know that the root cause of this disaster was the corruption of the booosh regime...as has been every other major crisis this administration has had to deal with, but when that's pointed out the corporate media is quick to harp that this is now a cop out, the statute of limitations on the boooosh era incompontence has expired...every crisis now belongs to Obama...and there are critics on the left who are ready to accept that meme as well.