BP Covering Up the Consequences

Pensacola Independent publisher Rick Outzen reported earlier today that a captain he knows says "boat crews" working the oil spill "have been ordered to not wear respirators, because BP doesn’t want a media helicopter to see the men and women wearing them."

The boat captain said, “I had a daughter call me, crying because her father was trapped in the oil and had the breathe the fumes.”

Mother Jones reporter Kate Sheppard writes, "BP is apparently barring cleanup workers from sharing photos of dead animals that have washed ashore." Nevertheless, she says, "the bodies are starting to add up."

Late last week, the US Fish and Wildlife Service, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and other responders issued a tally of the animals collected as of Friday in oil-impacted regions of Alabama, Florida , Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas—dead and alive. Those stats are shocking: 444 dead birds, 222 dead sea turtles, and 24 mammals (including dolphins).

Sheppard has asked the Unified Command for an updated report, but has not yet heard back.

We're expecting more such reports, and less factual accuracy from BP, as the days and weeks of spouting oil continue. As Duncan Black says, BP's --

theoretical primary responsibility is to their shareholders, in practice it's a bit more weighted towards the pockets of top executives. Birds and turtles, not so much.

Healthy people, not at all.

Live Feeds

A friendly neighboring blog says television entertainment around the world must really "suck." Why Now? draws that conclusion because "the one thing that everyone wants to watch is clouds of oil billowing out of a pipe a mile below the surface of the Gulf of Mexico."

The live video feeds showing in real time BP's leaking oil well have been up and down all over the Internet during the last twenty four hours -- on congressional web sites, cable news network web sites, web sites of scientists, environmentalists, bloggers -- you name it. One blog with the mysterious name of MeMiM even tried listing a number of links, none of which could show a working live feed within a couple of hours after the post went up.

The courageous congressman and senators who demanded BP make the feed publicly available were too right: public demand to see it is extremely high. So high, that many servers apparently are being overloaded.

Even so, in just one day the live feed has done its job. As Rep. Edward Markey (D-MA) said yesterday, "These videos stand as a scalding, blistering indictment of BP's inattention to the scope and size of the greatest environmental catastrophe in the history of the United States."

The live feed not only appalled, it forced BP to virtually admit it's been lying about the amount of oil pouring into the Gulf over the last month. Mother Jones reporter Kate Sheppard explains:

BP has been telling the world that only 5,000 barrels of oil are leaking out of its well in the bottom of the Gulf each day, despite the fact that outside experts believe the correct figure is probably more like 95,000 barrels. BP also says that the pipe inserted into the well to siphon oil to the surface is drawing about a fifth of the oil. As of their last announcement, that was about 1,000 barrels of oil per day.

But now BP says that actually it's siphoning 5,000 barrels per day—in other words, the total amount of oil the company says is spilling into the sea. But the live-feed of the spill site that was made available today clearly shows a whole lot of oil leaking into the Gulf.

Now that we've seen the leak on a live feed, she adds, there are only two possibilities: the oil driller has been deliberately lying or BP is "just bad at math."

BP is now making the feed available for public viewing (at this writing). If you trust BP not to fake the video like it falsifies the facts then CLICK HERE to see it. In our opinion, the world would be much better off if the feed were hosted by the terrific folk at Google -- they won't fake it for anyone.