BP oil spill to devastate Gulf fishing industry

[Zummie]

BP oil spill to devastate Gulf fishing industry

Thynara Ohm, a fisherman in Venice, Louisiana, said he is not going out shrimping this season because it simply is not worth it. “The shrimp and fish this season probably won’t be worth selling,” he said.

Ohm said that the oil spill came after a very bad year. Last year the price of shrimp was very low, but gas prices were very high, sending many fishermen out of business. “Last year, my brother-in-law barely made enough to cover his costs,” he said.

Ohm said that there were 800 fishing boats around Venice. “All the people around here are fishermen.”

Like many fishermen in the region, Ohm came to the United States from Cambodia thirty years ago. He has struggled to make ends meet as a small fisherman. His wife died three years ago, and he is recently remarried and has a six-month-old child. “My daughter was born premature. She needs a lot of care. I’m just worried about finding enough food for her and my wife, even for myself. What am I supposed to do?”

“I bought a boat last year, and now it’s worthless,” he added. “I was fortunate; I only had to borrow money for the engine. But a lot of other fishermen borrowed tens of thousands of dollars for their boats. Now they’ll go bankrupt; some will go hungry.” Ohm said the boats used by small fishermen can cost up to two hundred thousand dollars, but he valued his boat at about $60,000.

“Fishermen have it rough; we work for ourselves. When we get laid off, we don’t get unemployment. We bear the whole cost.” Some fishermen will work 24 hours a day two to three days in a row. “When they go out shrimping, they really push themselves.”

“That oil spill really hurt our people; hurt so much you wouldn’t believe it. This area is going to turn into a ghost town.”

The destruction of the fishing industry will have far broader consequences. Susan Yenni, a waitress at Cafe Noire in Metairie, said she was afraid the destruction of the seafood industry would hurt the restaurants. “So much of the city is dependent on the seafood industry. The restaurants, the hotels; we’re all going to get hurt. The higher prices will get passed down, and many places will shut their doors.”

“It’s not just one catch; this will hurt us for years to come. Thousands of families will be hurt.”

“It took so long to recover after Katrina, and now the same thing is happening.” Susan said she lost her home in the hurricane. “I lost everything I had.”

“I’m just an ordinary working class woman. It’s people like me who will get hurt. The poorest people are the ones who go out on the boats to fish. When BP does these things, cuts these corners, we’re the ones who end up struggling.”

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2010/ma...fish-m08.shtml

[Zummie]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uG8JH...layer_embedded

[Free_Jumper]

There's nothing to say after watching that.

[Big Fish Billy]

There's nothing to say after watching that.

Yup. liquid terror...and no Arab to blame.........

[Free_Jumper]

http://sites.google.com/site/teskela...ponse-cruise-1



Email from Dr. Vernon Asper, RV Pelican, May 5: "The first [image] is of the edge of the actual plume of oil rising to the surface. This grades from solid dark brown to what I would describe as aggregates of tan oil and then to a thin sheen of oil. In the heart of the slick, you can see intermittent clouds of gas hitting the surface and an occasional very black blob but those are rare. Further away, maybe 6-10 miles, most of the oil has been “dispersed” and is rather orange in color. Here in the slick, it’s mostly brown because they apparently haven’t applied the dispersants, most likely because of all of the ships in the area. And of course the odor is impressive. No one is on deck on the ships or the platform; we try to limit our exposure as well.
"This photo is of 3 of the large ships working over the leak. Two of these are from Norway; all have at least one ROV in the water and they also have cranes with large cables lowered over the side. We don’t see where they are pumping down dispersant to the actual leaks; no sign of large hoses or the like. Also visible in this picture is the drilling rig that has been placed nearby to relieve the pressure from the leak. We tried to contact anyone who would talk to us; on the “DD 3” (Development Driller III). We asked how close we could get; they said to stay 500 meters away which is amazing; we expected a much larger “CPA” (closest point of approach0

http://blogs.nature.com/news/thegrea...earth_environm
ent_ecology/oil_spill_science/

Dr. Vernon Asper is quoted by this blog in an asine way - he's actually quite brilliant (first hand) and you would never know it from the quote.....

Don't believe what you read right now - Allen Funt once hung a sign over interstate 95 that said "Delaware Closed". The whole show was dedicated to the folks that pulled over on the shoulder and couldn't figure out what to do next.. So much of this is an extended interstate 95....

For the visual exporers -

http://www.monstersandcritics.com/ne...empts-Continue



http://sites.google.com/site/teskela...ponse-cruise-1

Let's not have a controversy - however, Vernon Asper needs to be Chief Sci. in the future, dread with facts.