Gulf Oil Slick

[dreadgeek]

Originally Posted by popcorninthesofa

Aj; I understand about the motto ask the experts but they are saying that "we've never been in a hurricane situation where an oil spill occurred, or are keeping mum until something does ocurr. We the people are left to use our own noodles.

Okay but in order to use our own noodles we need *information* not just any information *good* information. Why is it that these blog websites know that there is a methane bubble that is going to explode any minute now but neither of the two premier American scientific magazines who have scientists *on-site and doing real-time analysis and reporting* know anything about it?

There is a lot of opportunity for hysterical overreaction (and I'm NOT saying you are being hysterical or overreacting) and so I think it is important that information that is being disseminated should be sourced and that the source should be reputable. BP I don't particularly trust because they have a fiscal interest in downplaying this. But the various universities that have sent researchers to the site as well as the USGS and the EPA have exactly the *opposite* motivation as BP--they have no fiduciary interest and their reputations can be made or destroyed on how they do their research.

My primary concern is that unsourced, uncorroborated information is being spread around and that THIS information--because it is dramatic and can be put out in a few short sentences--will crowd out *GOOD* information which is less dramatic and requires a bit more reading and digestion. Most people (again not saying you) will prefer the easily digestible bad information over the more difficult good information.

If someone drilled into an active volcano in the Gulf of Mexico, what is the name of the volcano? What are the coordinates of that volcano? A YouTube video makes great visuals but it doesn't actually provide information.

If the EPA air sampling is scary what, precisely, is scary about it? What datum scared you? Giving those charts a cursory reading didn't seem all that alarming.

I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm not saying you're right. I'm asking for information so I can use MY noodle but so far, the information has either been not-forthcoming, not reliable or unavailable.

I'm sorry to look at what appears to be a scientific problem with the eye of a scientist but, well, this IS a scientific and engineering problem and I think that it helps to look at it with the eye of a scientist or an engineer.