AFP
US authorities have closed to shrimping a section of the Gulf of Mexico near the area of a massive oil spill this year as a precautionary measure after a commercial shrimper found tar balls in his net.
The National Oceanographic and Oceanic Administration said on Wednesday the area closed to royal red shrimping is 10,000 square kilometres of Gulf of Mexico federal waters off Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama.
"The precautionary measure was taken after a commercial shrimper, having hauled in his catch of the deep water shrimp, discovered tar balls in his net," the agency said in a statement.
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The action marked the first closing after more than 99 per cent of Gulf waters had reopened to fishing, as the area recovered from the huge BP oil spill capped in July.
NOAA said it was taking the action "out of an abundance of caution" and due to the nature of this type of shrimp fishing.
"Fishing for royal red shrimp is conducted by pulling fishing nets across the bottom of the ocean floor. The tar balls found in the catch may have been entrained in the net as it was dragged along the seafloor," NOAA said.
"Other fishing at shallower depths in this area has not turned up any tar balls and is thus not impacted by this closure. The fisherman who reported this catch had trawled for brown shrimp in shallow waters in a different portion of the area to be closed earlier in the day without seeing tar balls."
Over 229,000 square kilometres were once closed to fishing due to concerns over the devastating spill, which continues to impact the Gulf's environment and economy.
BON SECOUR, Ala.) Bon Secour shrimpers say their nets and catch were covered with oil from Gulf floor during a shrimping trip off the coast Louisiana Saturday.
Debra Nelson says her husband and two sons headed offshore, about forty miles from where BP's oil rig exploded, to waters that were recently opened in hopes of catching royal red shrimp. When they pulled up the nets after a three-hour drag, they found an unusable catch coated in oil.
Nelson says she spent much of Saturday night and Sunday morning trying to reach officials who could help. The Coast Guard, Alabama Department of Environmental Management and a BP representative met with her Sunday in Bon Secour where the boat is based. Lt. Mike Patterson with Unified Area Command in New Orleans says samples of the shrimp and oil were collected for testing. But Nelson says no one has given her clear direction yet on how and when her boat will be decontaminated.
The Prayer For the Gulf by the mother of Drew Landry was read at the Grand Isle "Rally For The Truth"
by Drew.
It is a moving prayer full of hope for clean water in the future of our children.
The microphone I was using died during the rally and not one speech was recorded. The ONLY words recorded that day was Drew and "The Prayer For The Gulf". The battery waited until he said Amen to die!
After the rally Drew played at a local marina on Grand Isle for free, as he often does. He is one of many story tellers along the coast who will not let the truth be buried by BP's slick ads saying all's well, come on down! They need your help to carry out this work. Consider watching the video below and make donations to the organizations listed in the credits.
BP and the Coast Guard claim no more dispersants are being used in the gulf.
Our friend and sister on the Gulf took these shots.
It's bad enough to lie, but so arrogantly is more that I can stand. (JLW)
"So today I went to the pow wow. It was great. The REALLY wierd thing was in the same place we usually have the pow wow BP had a center for their equipment. The super wierd thing was that ther was acres of natural non- toxic stuff rotting away, while there we 176 empty containers of COREXIT 9527A, with barge and boat dispensers right by them. Weird, huh? I so happened to have a camera, of course.. so here ya go, draw your own conclusions folks... btw, can you say SERENDIPITOUS! All things to the Father." (Cherri Foytlin)
Photos were taken November 27, at Lamar Dixon Expo Center in Gonzales, LA around 3:00 in the afternoon.
GULF SHORES, Alabama -- The Gulf Shores City Council has agreed to settle with BP PLC for slightly less revenue than what officials estimated was lost during the year of the record-setting oil spill.
Gulf Shores City Councilman Jason Dyken.
A resolution passed at a special emergency meeting this week allows for Mayor Robert Craft to “communicate” the city’s “willingness to settle all of the city’s losses for taxes, royalties, rents, fees or net-profit shares ... or any other source of revenue or returns on investments arising out of the Deepwater Horizon incident.”While city officials have said that BP still owes $2,005,393 in lost revenue this year, the council agreed to a $1,839,311 settlement.
Councilman Jason Dyken, who also chairs the finance committee, views the settlement as a turning point.
“We’ll put 2010 to bed,” Dyken said, “and it structures us for 2011 with a safety net, so that we’re able to maintain the obligations to our citizens as well as the ability to grow and develop new services for our citizens. We’re excited to be able to spend our time proactively looking to the future instead of looking to the past and bickering about whose assumptions are correct.”
It’s still unclear, however, when BP plans to make the final 2010 payment.
Though BP could not provide a date as for when the claim would be paid, company officials have acknowledged working with the city on future payments.
The difference of about $166,000 between what city officials had estimated was owed and the settlement amount was not likely to impact Gulf Shore’s finances, said Cindy King, the city’s finance director.
“In the overall scope of our budget it’s not going to cause us to have to cut because we’ve been very frugal on our expenses,” King said.
Neither King nor Dyken could say why the city agreed to a lesser payment.
Dyken called the original dollar figures “assumptions” the city tossed at BP for months after oil started gushing from the busted rig.
He said the settlement was “fair.”
The last check BP cut was at the end of September for $1.69 million, which at the time brought total payment to the city to roughly $3 million.
That helped the city maintain payroll and pay bills for the rest of the year, King said.
How payments will be made next year is part of ongoing negotiations between the city and BP, according to King.
Craft has suggested providing BP with a quarterly revenue report in 2011, in which case the company would make up the difference between what was projected and what was generated.
In neighboring Orange Beach, a city affected on a similar economic level by the oil spill, officials continue to negotiate with BP on lost revenue claims, according to Mayor Tony Kennon.
Kennon believes the payments next year will be as significant as those recouping this year’s losses.
“A 2011 financial backstop for my community is absolutely necessary to create stability in our business community and to relieve some stress,” Kennon said.
BP, the government and an army of volunteers are fighting to contain and clean the millions of gallons of oil spewing from the site of the Deepwater Horizon explosion in the Gulf of Mexico.
Tuesday is the day that Feinberg wants to end emergency payments by BP's Gulf Coast Claims Facility to individuals and businesses for damage inflicted by the massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. After Thanksgiving, Feinberg will start offering lump-sum payments to people ready to settle all present and future claims - giving up their rights to file lawsuits.
But not everyone is buying into his plan.
Last Friday, a senior Justice Department official sent a letter to Feinberg warning of "concerns" over the pace of the claims process, the "overbroad" release forms for settlements, and the need for "additional transparency." The letter said "the success of the GCCF must be judged by whether the people of the Gulf feel fairly treated."
Earlier this month, Alabama Gov. Bob Riley (R) called Feinberg's claims process "extortion," and outgoing Alabama Attorney General Troy King issued a "consumer alert" warning people that Feinberg "works for BP." Feinberg was named by President Obama, though BP is paying him and four other lawyers at his firm $850,000 a month to run the fund.
Plaintiffs attorneys are also wary.
"It seems silly at this point, when we don't know what the long-term environmental effects are going to be," said one lawyer who said he didn't want to comment publicly until he has seen details of Feinberg's offers. "Why are they essentially . . . coming just before Christmas and flashing some money in front of people's eyes and trying to get them to waive their rights? That's not the optimal situation."
As of Nov. 18, the BP claims fund made $1.88 billion of emergency payments to 86,728 individuals and 31,271 businesses. Feinberg and his team have rejected 56,197 claims. Feinberg received a total of 400,516 of damage claims, but only 8,055 of them were for final settlements.
As a result, Feinberg has agreed to make "interim" payments , which will be reviewed every three months instead of every six months. Now gulf coast residents and businesses face this dilemma: If they want to hang on to their rights to sue BP and other companies, they can keep getting payments from Feinberg's fund that will be reviewed, and possibly terminated. If they are ready to take lump sums for all present and future damages, they have to sign away their right to sue the London-based oil giant later.
"If I were a private lawyer, I would recommend that my clients take the money now," Feinberg said recently. He said "finality is a virtue." Moreover, with fisheries and coastlines reopening for business, in a year or two damages might appear smaller than they do today.
If the emergency payment program is any indication, coming up with final settlements won't be easy.
Feinberg has made a career out of running big funds, such as the one for victims of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. He has relied on legal techniques to calculate payments designed to shortcut lengthy litigation. The Exxon Valdez case is the poster child of what can happen otherwise: it dragged on for 20 years, a big settlement was slashed on appeal, final payments were modest and many plaintiffs died before receiving anything.
Although $20 billion might seem like enough to go around, Feinberg wants proof of damages, and that proof isn't clear-cut. A chiropractor says business is slow because there aren't as many people fishing. The Plaquemines Parish government is providing forms on which people write their names and a dollar figure with no backup documents; they declare that they deserve money "due to the hardship caused by the oil spill." Claims have also come from beer distributors and dentists.
Florida restaurant and lodging businesses say they suffered because tourists were frightened off by predictions - incorrect as it turned out - that oil would reach their shores. Feinberg has been battling plaintiffs' lawyers over the question of "proximity," meaning how close to soiled coastlines is close enough for payments.
Feinberg and his team - he has 3,000 people reviewing claims - have also unearthed 1,200 cases of alleged fraud. For a fee, a ring of more than a dozen boat owners and a tax preparer allegedly drew up and distributed fake documents to people who falsely claimed to be deckhands. One woman allegedly stole the identity of her dead sister so she could file a claim. Several individuals fabricated documents showing they owned gift shops that didn't exist. A person who was already in prison during the oil spill filed a claim for lost earnings.
Lawyer Mike Papantino, in a September interview, said that the escrow fund should have been bigger. But when asked whether he'd rather take $20 billion now versus litigating for a decade for $60 billion, he said he would rather take the money now.
"I want things to recover here. I'd love to see it work for $20 billion," he said.
It will be a long journey, but if America doesn't embrace alternative energy resources, we will be in the new dark age searching for that last lump of coal.
Even Santa Clause knows coal is for bad boys and girls!
(video) Ronald Ⓥ BlomHave a look in one off my motivation maps.There are several wind videos from Belgium Denmark Holland and especially from Germany in my video section. Have a look there is still some hope. German Eifel good feeling windmills, There are windmills everywhere in Germany and they give a positive feeling, and 1 on every 5 ho...uses has already a total sunroof. They are getting to 30% real clean wind and solar this year. They created more than 300.000 new long time green jobs in just two years.http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100001230530710&v=app_2392950137#!/video/video.php?v=117999451584405
Take a look at these. In Belgium and many other places in Europe, this is typical and affordable.
