This video from the USA says about itself:
This is the saddest video I ever made. I cried through the whole thing and will probably never watch it again. Crude oil has been GUSHING into our Gulf at the rate of 800,000 gallons per day.
What follows is the news story that accompanied these pictures.
Here’s what President Obama didn’t see when he visited the Gulf Coast: a dead dolphin rotting in the shore weeds.
“When we found this dolphin it was filled with oil. Oil was just pouring out of it. It was the saddest darn thing to look at,” said a BP contract worker who took the Daily News on a surreptitious tour of the wildlife disaster unfolding in Louisiana.
His motive: simple outrage.
“There is a lot of coverup for BP. They specifically informed us that they don’t want these pictures of the dead animals. They know the ocean will wipe away most of the evidence. It’s important to me that people know the truth about what’s going on here,” the contractor said.
“The things I’ve seen: They just aren’t right. All the life out here is just full of oil. I’m going to show you what BP never showed the President.”
The day was 85 degrees, the blue sky almost white with sunshine, the air fresh with salt tang.
After checking that he was unobserved, he motored out to Queen Bess barrier island, known to the locals as Bird Island.
The grasses by the shore were littered with tarred marine life, some dead and others struggling under a thick coating of crude.
“When you see some of the things I’ve seen, it would make you sick,” the contractor said. “No living creature should endure that kind of suffering.”
Queen Bess Island was the first place where fledglings were born when the beloved, endangered Louisiana brown pelicans were reintroduced in the 1970s. Their population rebounded and was finally declared stabilized in 2002.
Now their future is once again in doubt. In what had been such an important hatchery, hundreds of pelicans – their white heads stained black – stood sentinel. They seemed slow and lethargic.
“Those pelicans are supposed to have white heads. The black is from the oil. Most of them won’t survive,” the contractor said.
“They keep trying to clean themselves. They try and they try, but they can’t do it.”
The contractor has been attempting to save birds and turtles.
“I saw a pelican under water with only its wing sticking out,” he said. “I grabbed it and lifted it out of the water. It was just covered in oil. It was struggling so hard to survive. We did what we could for it.
“Nature is cruel, but what’s happening here is crueler.”
The uninhabited barrier islands are surrounded by yellow floating booms, also stained black, that are supposed to keep the oil out. It’s not working.
“That grass was green a few weeks ago,” the contractor said. “Now look. … This whole island is destroyed. How do you write a check for something like this?”
He said he recently found five turtles drowning in oil.
“Three turtles were dead. Two were dying and not dead yet. They will be,” he said.
As the boat headed back amid the choppy waves, a pod of dolphins showed up to swim with the vessel and guide it to land.
“They know they are in trouble. We are all in trouble,” the contractor said.
BP’s central role in the disaster cleanup has apparently given the company a lot of latitude in keeping the press away from beaches where the oil is thickest.
On Monday, a Daily News team was escorted away from a public beach on Elmer’s Island bycops who said they were taking orders from BP.
BP spokesman Toby Odone denied the company is trying to hide the environmental damage; he noted BP has organized press visits to the spill zone and said BP cannot tell cops what to do.
The contractor for BP said the public needs to see the truth.
“BP is going to say the deaths of these animals wasn’t oil-related,” he said. “We know the truth. I hope these pictures get to the right people – to someone who can do something.”
Experts warn of a long-term public health crisis on the US Gulf Coast as a result of BP’s Deepwater Horizon oil spill: here.
Cameron negotiates BP–Libya minefield in Washington: here.
‘Oil-spill ambassadors’ moved to Chicago’s Brookfield Zoo: White Pelicans may offer clues on future rescues: here.
White Pelicans rescued from oil spill with wing injuries (unreleasable), moved to Chicago’s Brookfield Zoo.
Brewing storm all but paralyzes Gulf oil spill containment efforts: here.
A comment on this video from the USA:
Brilliantly explaining the causes of the horrific 2005 explosion in BP’s Texas City refinery, the first two thirds of this video presents evidence supporting the conclusion that lethal so-called accidents don’t indicate that BP managers are deviating from BP’s operating strategy, but that they are loyally carrying it out.
As shown in Congressman Henry Waxman‘s letter to BP CEO Hayward, and the Waxman-Stupak hearings …, BP maximizes profits by systematically violating human and environmental safety. The video deteriorates in the last third and ends with a sad attempt to praise BP as having changed. In 2009, one year after it was produced, BP got the largest fines of any company ever for not making good on ending safety violations at Texas City, and for adding hundreds of new ones.
BP Top Hat cap tests are inconclusive: here.
Three of Four Oil Lobbyists Came From Government, Washington Post Says: here.
Nearly 4000 birds, 709 Sea Turtles, 67 Mam (Dolphins), 2 Reptiles: Total Gulf oil spill animal number report.
Latest oiled bird numbers: Captured alive: 1397, Collected dead: 2599, Released clean: 551: here.
BBC news: Brown pelicans still in danger in the Gulf of Mexico oil spill: here.
Keeping a watchful eye: Scientists asking public to report oil spill specially banded released Gulf birds: here.
Why should we give a damn about BP’s stock while its criminal negligence annihilates the Gulf? Here.
According to internal BP survey, workers feared reprisal for reporting safety concerns: here.
Dear Kitty. Some blog 
Oil spill clean-up mission resumed
China: State-owned fuel-producer CNPC has announced that a vital pipeline has resumed operations after an explosion caused the country’s largest reported oil spill.
Clean-up efforts – marred by the drowning death of a firefighter – continued over a 165 square mile stretch of the Yellow Sea.
Roughly 400,000 gallons of oil spilled into the sea – as compared with 184 million gallons in the BP oil spill off the US coast.
http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/index.php/news/content/view/full/93134
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Residents of the Gulf coast are bracing once again for a tropical storm headed their way. Such a storm could make the BP oilspill – already a disaster – much worse, bringing poisoned waters further inland.
This sort of environmental catastrophe must never happen again. Please join The Wilderness Society in urging Congress to pass Rep. Rahall’s CLEAR Act (HR 3534), which will bring critically needed reforms to oil industry practices, onshore and offshore.
Thanks for all you do!
Bob Fertik
—
Big Oil is still trying to drill in wild lands across the west.
Send a letter to Congress by Monday, August 2 demanding real reform of Big Oil.
Dear Activist,
The devastating oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico may be capped for now, but the crisis is far from over. Big Oil and Gas continue to seek access to beloved lands across America.
Places like Utah’s Red Rock country, the magnificent Wyoming Range, and the incomparable Arctic Refuge, could all suffer catastrophic damage from oil and gas drilling. During the next few weeks we have new, quickly moving opportunities for long-term protection of these places, and others.
Please urge Congress to pass the CLEAR Act, and establish real reform of Big Oil and Gas. Action in the House is imminent. Help us reach our goal of 50,000 letters in support of changing the way Big Oil and Gas does business!
We managed to stave off the Bush administration’s attempt to open up 80 percent of Utah’s Red Rock country to oil and gas leasing. But it’s up to us to ensure that safeguards are enacted to prevent the oil and gas industry from drilling anywhere and any way they want again.
Supporters like you helped pass the Wyoming Range Legacy Act last year, which put parts of the Bridger Teton national forest off limits to new leasing. Unfortunately, existing leases still remain and the Plains Exploration & Production oil company is trying right now to get permits to drill more than 100 new wells in roadless country.
And for more than two decades, the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge has been one of the most highly sought after areas by Big Oil. Former Alaska governor Sarah Palin (the outspoken proponent of “drill, baby, drill”) recently suggested that drilling in the Arctic Refuge would be safer than deep water drilling. But with your continued support, we won’t allow that to happen. The consequences of drilling in this pristine wild place would be disastrous for the delicate habitat and wildlife that call it home.
The Wilderness Society is working in Congress, in the courts and with federal agencies to protect these and other areas from drilling.
You can help by writing Congress in support of comprehensive reform of Big Oil and Gas. We want to change the way the Oil and Gas industry does business on federal lands and in offshore waters, requiring tougher environmental reviews, better audits to ensure proper royalties are paid to taxpayers, and protections for communities. Please, make sure that message gets delivered.
Congress’s summer recess is right around the corner. The House could vote at any time. Please make sure your representative hears from you. Our goal is to deliver 50,000 letters to Congress in support of oil and gas reform.
Send a letter to your representative in support of reforms today.
The disastrous oil spill in the Gulf is a keen reminder of how urgent it is that we protect our wild places that are still untouched by drilling.
Sincerely,
Kathy Kilmer
The Wilderness Society
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