U.S. Plans ‘for Worst’ in Gulf, Seeing Risk in Leak Strategy

The President is showing a lack of leadership that's very disappointing. For the Governor of LA to have to get on television and beg for resources is insulting beyond imagination. Over the last year and a half the President gave a couple of trillion public dollars to private business. Now it's time for one these agents of evil to pay the public. BP has enormous resources. For them to be telling us they will honor all legitimate claims is bizarre. We should be telling them. The President should collect the money in advance (start with a 20 billion down payment) and assure LA and the other gulf states and all the injured parties that money is in hand and is being disbursed efficiently. We made you and you work for us, not big oil, Barack. Stop the usual political bs. Get off your butt, show some moxie, and get the money. NOW! Just ignore this troll.

The governor of Louisiana is a Republican. His interests are his party's. The troll wants to hear the screams from business about NEW TAXES.

There are far too many bloody shirts in these pages. Screams and riot will not stop the well.

let me throw a few numbers at this mess. water is incompressible. it is as dense at the surface as it is a mile deep. the pressure at 5000 feet down is about 2000psi

I would not expect to see bubbles.

The well is a further 13,000 feet deep. Water pressure at the bottom of the well would be 8000 psi. 5000 psi higher than the pressure on the well head.

"Mud" pressure would about twice water pressure. 16000 psi plus pump pressure in a full pipe mud to the bottom of the well situation. maybe 17000 psi. I gathered from the comment stream at "the oil drum" that the hydrocarbon pressure at the well head, 5000 feet down, is about 13,000 psi. This will not be countered by 5000 psi mud. There was never any hope of top kill working. They did manage to suppress the hydrocarbon flow so they did get more than 12, 000 psi mud pressure at the well head. Those are some hoses. The pumps were way over redline. Valiant effort, no prise.

The oil business must learn. BP is the walking dead.