Plug the Well

Two letters in my local paper caught my attention recently. Grouped under the title of “Gulf spill was badly managed”, these letters showed how little people seem to understand what was involved and how political biases shaped their view.

One letter said “If you have wondered how John McCain and Sarah Palin would have handled the problem, read her book ‘Going Rouge.’ I don’t think it would take anywhere near three months.” OK so pray tell what would John and Sarah do differently? John would of gone here and there doing a bunch of stuff with out knowing what he was doing like he did when we were faced with economic collapse and he “rushed” back to Washington during his campaign to fix things. But first he stopped by the Late Show with David Letterman to have a little chat. Remember that?

And of course Sarah knows all about oil. She’s from Alaska and has seen oil from her back yard and therefore is an expert. Wonder Woman Palin would don a wet suit and dive in to plug that nasty well. Oh gee, it’s a mile down? Well it might take a little longer for Mrs. Palin.

But the second letter was, to me, the kicker. The writer said, “The oil has been spilling out for months and now they are capping it off. I’d like to know why it took so long just to put a cap on it?” I mean what was the big problem BP? Just come up with some sort of beanie and cap the sucker! Gee don’t you guys in the oil business know anything?

This really points out to me how people generally don’t bother to check all the facts and get informed about things like this oil spill disaster. I seem to recall that BP tried a couple of times to put some sort of cap on the well and it failed. Does anyone watching this from afar really know what is involved when drilling over a mile down in the ocean? Does anyone know how much complex equipment is required to work at those depths and pressures? Of course everyone would of like to have seen the well shut down as soon as possible, especially BP. Not only was this a huge publicity nightmare for BP, it was a real hit to their bottom line. And the costs to them will go on for years. Does anyone smell lawsuits?

I’m not saying we should just sit back and say nothing when an environmental disaster like this occurs, but we should gather all the facts before we make uninformed comments. I know it takes time and effort to get all the facts before one spouts off but maybe we should log off of Facebook for a couple of minutes and get educated on the facts.