Be INFORMED

Monday, July 26, 2010

Gulf Coast Oil Problems…

… are nothing new, but, apparently there have been more than reported.

    According to an article in the St.Petersburg Times,

there have been quite a few that were worse than we thought that they were.

One big spill was 160,638 barrels in 1967 when an anchor tore a hole in a corroded pipeline operated by Humble Oil, a unit of Exxon; it leaked for 13 days. In 1969, a blowout on a Union Oil well spilled 80,000 barrels, killing 4,000 birds and seeping for four years after being plugged. In 1974, a Pennzoil pipeline break spilled 19,833 barrels probably because an anchor was dragged across the submerged line. Another anchor tore open an Amoco pipeline in 1988, spilling 15,576 barrels. A Shell pipeline leak in 1990, discovered when a helicopter noticed a heavy oil slick 25 miles by 15 miles, spilled 14,423 barrels.

    Oil executives and a few of our politicians assert that newer technology has made oil drilling more safer. As proof, they point us to hurricanes Rita and Katrina.

"I think people are reassured that not a drop of oil was spilled during Katrina or Rita," Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said in 2008. "Those rigs in the gulf, there was not a single incident of spillage that anyone reported."

But while the overwhelming majority of safety valves did work during the two hurricanes, the MMS reported that there were five modest-sized spills, each between 1,000 and 2,000 barrels. There were also 125 small spills, many from riser pipes or storage tanks on platforms. Altogether, they added up to 16,302 barrels, almost a quarter as big as the 1969 spill off Santa Barbara, Calif., that helped give rise to the modern environmental movement.

    Anyway, the article goes on speaking of some of the less known problems with our wells and the pipelines that run under the Gulf.

    Read it all right here.

Saturday, July 24, 2010

Apartment Hunting:Sins Of The Past Will Get You…

… if you live down here in Florida.

   My girlfriend and myself have been in the hunt for an apartment for the past month or so, making more of an effort over the last two weeks. She wants to get out of her place and I am tired of the dump in which I live. She has been the roommate of the lessee so she has not had to go through those background checks and what have you. As for myself? I have never had a criminal background check down on me, so this is all new to me. It isn’t a problem since I’ll pass them anyway. Wish that I could say the same for the girlfriend. Two arrests for cocaine possession, a decade ago, and a few other charges are now coming back to haunt her.

   Needless to say, it is also haunting me, and I have nothing to do with this crap! I’ve had a few managers tell me that they’ve always had to pass a background check when renting a place, but this is the first time that I’ve ever run into this problem.

   The last place that we went to told me that with her record, all that we would be able to rent would more than likely be either apartments on the less desirable areas of town, or mobile homes in those same kinds of areas. Places where management doesn’t care about the past, just your money! Then you get to live next door to the prostitutes, crack heads,pill poppers, and of course, those dreaded alcoholics. I have very little tolerance for drinkers.

   Anyway, we have one more week to find a place, which not going to be an easy thing to do.