Good Question.Why Does The BP Disaster Affect You?

We went to dinner with some friends last night and I took quite a bit of the kind of good natured chiding only friends and loved ones can give for how much time I've been spending following the BP disaster. (It's been alot)

One friend, who has been watching the story on the news finally asked directly "I get that this is an environmental catastrophe, I get that life on the Gulf is going to be forever changed but you're in Minnesota, why does the BP disaster affect you so personally?"

Good question and one that I think everyone should be asking.

Here was my answer:

"You mean besides the fact I haven't seen hide nor hair of the Fabian Shrimp truck?

Here's the effect that I believe this will have on me and everyone else. When I was in grade school, we learned about rain and just how much rain we receive here began as water evaporating in the Gulf of Mexico and then then rode the gulf stream north to become clouds and rain down here only to start the process all over again. (Funny how some simplified lessons stick with you isn't it?)

With BP having decided to use chemical dispersant to break down the oil in the ocean (as opposed to bringing some tankers in to suck it up and clean it later (as described in an article I read this morning http://bit.ly/93Gns6 ), I believe that when this now chemically infused water evaporates and becomes rain elsewhere, hell everywhere, BP will not only be responsible for the largest oil spill we have ever seen, but they will also be responsible for poisoning all of us, when, in a few years, the water systems and food systems are proven to be contaminated.


If we don't stop only living in the immediate moment and force ourselves to cast a wary eye on the future and then start demanding more responsibility from BP and the people in charge who are deferring to BP's expertise which got us in to this mess, well, let me just say it ain't going to be pretty. I now believe that this is going to make us wish global warming was our worst problem....."

Dinner went on, conversation kept flowing and hopefully, a few seeds were planted.

An aside? Today Robert Dudley from BP was on Meet the Press:

(You can read the whole article here: http://tinyurl.com/2562aeh )


BP is optimistic that its latest attempt to stop the gush of oil from a broken well in the Gulf of Mexico could show results by the end of the week," the company’s managing director said Sunday in an interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press.

The new strategy is being tried after company abandoned its most ambitious bid yet for a temporary fix Saturday when BP said the “top kill” option — an attempt to overwhelm the broken well with heavy fluids and junk — had failed.

That strategy, which sought to stop the flow of oil, was always a long shot, Robert Dudley, the company’s managing director and head of disaster management, told NBC’s David Gregory on Sunday.

The probability is “much better” that the new approach, which seeks to contain the spread of the oil, will show good results this week, he said.

As I commented on the article: So BP now wants to contain the oil instead of stopping it? From where I'm sitting, with the exception of a top kill which most experts seemed to agree from the outset wasn't going to work, that seems to have been their goal all along.

I hate this company.