Tag Archives: Coast Guard

BP’s Financial Impact Plan Went Into Effect Immediately

06 Tuesday Jul 2010

Posted by in BP, Deepwater Horizon, Energy, Environment, Gulf Oil Spill

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In the days following the Deepwater Horizon explosion, BP, aided and abetted by the Coast Guard, initially said there was no oil leaking. Later that was expanded to 1,000 barrels a day and then to 5.000 barrels a day. At the same time, BP execs like Tony Hayward and Dave Rainey were saying the effects of the spill would be “modest” and “minor,” and Hayward added that BP was “focused on doing everything in our power to stop the flow of oil, remove it from the surface and protect the shoreline.”

It turns out the only thing BP was doing “everything in their power” to stop the flow of in that early period was litigation. And what they sought to protect was not the shoreline, but the company from legal liability caused by that non-existent spill and the “minimal” damage it might have:

“In the immediate aftermath of the Deepwater Horizon disaster, BP publicly touted its expert oil clean-up response, but it quietly girded for a legal fight that could soon embroil hundreds of attorneys, span five states and last more than a decade.

BP swiftly signed up experts who otherwise would work for plaintiffs. It shopped for top-notch legal teams. It presented volunteers, fishermen and potential workers with waivers, hoping they would sign away some of their right to sue.

[…]

Robert J. McKee, an attorney with the Fort Lauderdale firm of Krupnick Campbell Malone, was surprised by how quickly BP hired scientists and laboratories specializing in the collection and analysis of air, sea, marsh and beach samples — evidence that’s crucial to proving damages in pollution cases.

Five days after the April 20 blowout, McKee said, he tried to hire a scientist who’s assisted him in an ongoing 16-year environmental lawsuit in Ecuador involving Dupont.

“It was too late. He’d already been hired by the other side,” McKee said.

Apparently, BP did have a working financial impact plan ready to be implemented on a moment’s notice, if not an environmental one. Priorities.

An Idea to Help Pay For the Cleanup—Corporate Sponsorships

16 Wednesday Jun 2010

Posted by in BP, Deepwater Horizon, Energy, Environment, Gulf Oil Spill

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I have an idea to help pay for the oil spill cleanup. The Feds can sell corporate sponsorships, like sports arenas and stadiums do. The government agencies involved are already doing BP’s bidding at every turn thus far, they might as well bring in some revenue to help defray the costs.

There’s the BP/EPA, who ordered that a less toxic dispersant than Corexit be used—almost a month ago. Corexit is still being dumped in the Gulf.

There’s BP/OSHA who said that cleanup workers don’t need respirators, despite increasing reports of illness. No respirators are needed because BP’s own air quality tests said there’s no need. Case closed.

There’s the BP/Coast Guard who threatened to arrest CBS journalists who were trying to cover the spill’s damage. “BP’s rules.”

There’s the BP/FAA, who denied Southern Seaplane permission to fly over the affected areas when they found out a photojournalist was on board.

There’s the BP/DHS, who told Senator Bill Nelson that there would be no journalists allowed on a trip he was taking on a BP/Coast Guard vessel.

Finally there’s the BP/Louisiana Dept. of Wildlife and Fisheries whose employee told Mac McClelland of Mother Jones that he had to leave Isle Grand Terre, LA because “WE don’t need this on camera.”

“This” meaning this; a beach covered in oil with no cleanup crew in sight:

And a dead dolphin.

The way I see it, if all these agencies are going to be BP’s bitches, they may as well get paid for it.