On 22 April, 2010, a deep-water British Petroleum platform off the coast of Louisiana exploded and sank in the Gulf of Mexico. US authorities estimate about five-thousand barrels of oil are escaping into gulf waters each day as a result, and all efforts to stymie the flow have failed. British Petroleum has pumped about 400,000 gallons of dispersant into the Gulf in any effort to minimize a clearly disastrous spill. Still, British Petroleum CEO Tony Hayward deemed it necessary to place the damage in the proper context:
The Gulf of Mexico is a very big ocean. The amount of volume of oil and dispersant we are putting into it is tiny in relation to the total water volume.
I am certain beachcombers and fisherfolk dislocated by the spill will take considerable comfort from Mr. Hayward's apologetic response.
Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill
as Seen from Space
I was first alerted to this delightful piece of nonsense by TollandRCR, a New England sociology professor who posted Mr. Hayward's outrageous comment as an ironic signature to his own comments on PolitiJab. I discovered more about Mr. Hayward and the spill itself by scanning the online edition of the Guardian with a specific focus on one 14 May 2010 article. The satellite imagery was taken from LiveScience.
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