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National News Networks Consider Brent Coon
THE Oil Spill Litigation Expert
As a Gulf Coast-based law firm, BCA is considered the world’s foremost experts on BP. Mr. Coon and his team are appearing on CNN, CNBC, MSNBC and every major news network on an ongoing basis as the primary legal spokespeople for the oil spill litigation. Our firm led the charge against British Petroleum following the 2005 explosion at the BP Texas City Refinery that killed 15 people. Brent Coon was awarded the “Lawyer of the Year” award by the American Association for Justice for his efforts. See All
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Why the Attorneys of Brent Coon & Associates?
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Are You Affected?
BCA has created specific sections of this website for those affected by the Oil Spill
and the Oil Spill Claims process.
Shrimpers, Fishing and Charter Boat Owners
The oil spill in the Gulf is affecting shrimpers, the fishing industry and charter boat owners in a unique way.
Learn more...
Business Owners
Always a hot spot for tourism, Gulf Coast business owners’ livelihood depends on vacationers traveling to the Gulf Coast and patronizing the local businesses.
Learn more...
Real Estate, Condo Owners
If you’re a property owner along the Gulf Coast, Brent Coon & Associates can help you recoup the losses you’re experiencing as a result of the oil spill.
(With Seminar Video)
Learn More...
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BCA vs British Petroleum
Timeline of Major Events Relating to BP's Fatal Errors
2001
January 2001—BP paid $10 million to resolve allegations it violated the Clean Air Act at 8 of its refineries
February 2001—Minerals Management Service (“MMS”) fined BP $20,000 for workplace violations resulting in serious injury to an employee
August 2001—Worker killed at BP Texas City refinery
September 2001—Occupational Safety and Health Administration (“OSHA”) fines BP $141,000 after an explosion killed three workers at BP’s Clanton Road facility
2002
January 2002—MMS fined BP $20,000 for a safety violation
May 2002—MMS fined BP $23,000 for a workplace safety violation that resulted in a worker having his hand injured from an electrical shock
May 2002—Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation required BP to pay a $150,000 fine for pipeline leaks
September 2002—MMS fined BP $39,000 for missing 13 monthly tests of an oil low level sensor
2003
January 2003—BP fined $70,000 by MMS for a faulty fire water system
January 2003—BP fined $80,000 by MMS for bypassing pressure safety relays
July 2003—MMS fined BP $20,000 because a subsurface safety valve was blocked out of service
2004
February 2004—MMS fined BP $25,000 because they had bypassed the oil rigs gas detections systems
March 2004—Explosion at the UU4 unit at BP Texas City
May 2004—Worker falls to his death inside a tank at BP Texas City
July 2004—MMS fined BP $190,000 for safety violations that resulted in a fire.
September 2004—Two workers are killed and a third is severely injured during a steam release at BP Texas City
2005
March 2005—15 people are killed in an explosion at BP Oil Refinery in Texas City
May 2005—Worker dies at BP Cherry Point Refinery
July 2005—Explosion and fire at BP Texas City
September 2005—OSHA cited BP for 296 egregious willful violations associated with the March 23, 2005 explosion and fined BP $21 million dollars
2006
April 2006—OSHA fines BP $2.4 million for safety violations at the Toledo, Ohio refinery
October 2006—MMS fined BP $25,000 because operations were not performed in a safe and workmanlike manner
February 2006—Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (“TCEQ”) fined BP $130,625 for unlawful releases of harmful pollutants at its Texas City refinery
March 2006—Major oil leak in Prudhoe Bay Alaska from a corroded pipelines operated by BP
July 2006—Worker dies at BP Texas City refinery
2007
March 2007—US Chemical Safety & Hazard Board concluded that the Texas City disaster was caused by organization and safety deficiencies at all levels of the BP Corporation
April 2007—Chemical release at BP Texas City
June 2007—Worker dies by electrocution at BP Texas City.
August 2007—Diver killed at BP Cherry Point Refinery
October 2007—BP agreed to pay a $50 million fine and plead guilty to a felony violation of the Clean Air Act and will serve three years of probation for the Texas City refinery explosion
October 2007—MMS fined BP $41,000 for various safety violations
October 2007—BP pled guilty to a criminal violation of the Clean Water Act and paid a $20 million fine related to two separate oil spills that occurred in the North Slope in March and August of 2006
2008
January 2008—BP employee dies BP Texas City
2009
April 2009—Whistleblower files lawsuit against BP for breaking federal laws and violating their own internal procedures by failing to maintain crucial safety and engineering documents related to the Atlantis Deepwater Drilling rig
October 2009—OSHA fines BP an additional $87 million dollars for their failure to abate the violations from the March 23, 2005 explosion
December 2009—Texas jury returned a $100 million award against BP on behalf or workers injured in a 2007 chemical release
2010
April 2010—OSHA fines BP $2 million for willful safety violations at the Toledo Ohio refinery.
April 2010—Explosion and fire destroys BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Rig, releasing millions of gallons of crude oil into the Gulf of Mexico
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The Department of Justice v. BP
The Criminal Investigation
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Daily BP Evidence Release
A Study of the Economic Impact of the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill
Part One - Fisheries
Prepared by IEM
A Study of the Economic Impact of the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill
Part Two - Moratoria
Prepared by IEM
Plantiff's Memorandum in Response to the Court's Order of Sept 1st regarding the effect of the B1 Order on Other Claims (9/12/11)
GCCF Reports "Successes?"
While GCCF Reports "Successes" - State and Local governments strongly disagree, file major law suit.
Click to read the documents |
BP Not in Compliance
In 2009, OSHA and the Department of Labor found that BP was not in compliance with the original 2005 plea agreement put in effect after the Texas City Explosion. This document details OSHA's findings.
Click here to read the document
BP's Refusal to Share Internal Documents
This letter from Transocean attorneys to BP documents BP’s refusal to share internal documents and data to assist all parties in the investigative process.
Click here to read the document
Lessons Not Learned
At press conferences in the U.S. and overseas, BP spokespersons repeatedly say how “much they’ll learn.” This catchphrase also permeated their media messages five years ago in Texas City. The only problem is….they didn’t learn. And as they say it all again, history is destined to repeat itself until they actually do it.
Read the Overview
Lessons Learned - Broadribb - CCPS Conference
TCR Explosion- The Lessons Learned (Mogford speech in Orlando)
Fact_Sheet- BP_2009 Monitoring Inspection
The Cost of Human Life
When BP and Amoco merged, there were differences in each companies Risk Management Guidelines. Of particular note, BP was not only willing, but “embraced the policy” of assigning a monetary value on the worth of human life for cost benefit analysis purposes.
Read the Overview
Read the Document
The "Aircraft Carrier"
BP’s own personnel saying on March 23rd 2005 in a Texas refinery survey that if BP Texas City were an aircraft carrier, they’d be “at the bottom of the ocean” – hours later the refinery exploded and ironically, five years later, they ARE at the bottom of the ocean
Read the Overview
Read the Document
The "Schiavo" Document
An example of BP’s PR machine going into action less than three hours after the BP Texas City plant erupted in fire, saying that they thought the entire incident would be able to just "go away; due to the holiday weekend" and noting that Terry Schiavo was a big enough media issue to mask the tragedy.
Read the Overview
The "Schiavo" Document
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Gulf Coast Disaster Site Map
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Brent Coon & Associates in the News
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| October 5, 2011, 9:12 am |
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Originally posted by Dahr Jamail - Al Jazeera - October 3, 2011
"If you got caught humping another woman - [if] you're both naked and caught in the act - you'd want BP to explain to your wife how it didn't happen."
This colorful analogy was proposed by Dean Blanchard, a seafood distributor on Grand Isle, Louisiana, to explain oil giant BP's continuing machinations to evade liability in the aftermath of the April 2010 disaster.
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| September 16, 2011, 9:40 am |
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Reuters
Findings of the second major investigation by the U.S. government into the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill, may press BP into putting over $30 billion on the table to quickly settle its outstanding legal headaches.
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| May 19, 2011, 8:40 am |
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Beaumont attorney Brent Coon has spent the last several months filing claims on behalf of the 5,000 Deepwater Horizon plaintiffs his firm represents.
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| April 20, 2011, 10:09 am |
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Last fall, Iris Cross beamed into millions of homes, the friendly BP worker hailing from New Orleans who assured TV viewers that the oil giant won’t stop cleaning up the worst oil spill in U.S. history “until we make this right.”
She became the very public face of BP, a soothing contrast to former CEO Tony Heyward, whose PR gaffes cemented public opinion against the oil company.
This is not the first time Cross sought to soothe public anger from a BP disaster. One of her efforts in 2006 so angered a judge that BP was accused of jury tampering and threatened with fines and contempt charges.
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| April 20, 2011, 10:04 am |
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Ryan Lambert is enraged.
The owner of a charter fishing business, he had always supported the oil industry in his home state of Louisiana.
He previously trusted BP, and the rest of the oil industry, to do the right thing in case an accident happened. But not any more. "I'm seeing people starving to death and BP won't pay them," said Lambert.
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| April 18, 2011, 7:37 am |
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NEW ORLEANS, Louisiana, Apr 17, 2011 (IPS) - Attorney Kenneth Feinberg, paid by BP to administer the firm's 20-billion-dollar compensation fund, has become the focal point of anger for Gulf residents who are angry, frustrated and desperate for help following last year's massive oil disaster.
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| March 29, 2011, 9:21 am |
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FORT WALTON BEACH — Don’t give up. You have people ready to help you fight BP.
A handful of those people passed along that message to local residents and business owners Monday night at the Fort Walton Beach Municipal Auditorium.
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| March 28, 2011, 9:09 am |
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BP Plc (BP/) can conduct additional tests on the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig’s blowout prevention equipment now that government examiners have finished their own forensic testing, a judge ruled.
“The additional BOP testing shall be performed in a manner that preserves the evidence to the maximum extent possible,’’ U.S. District Judge Carl Barbier said in his order, referring to the blowout prevention equipment. He ruled that other companies involved in the disaster could also now run additional tests, so long as everyone is allowed to monitor the procedures and share in the results.
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| February 3, 2011, 9:44 am |
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New York Times
The Gulf of Mexico should recover from the environmental damage caused by the enormous BP oil spill last year faster than many people expected, according to new estimates in reports commissioned by Kenneth R. Feinberg, the administrator of the $20 billion compensation fund.
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| February 2, 2011, 9:54 am |
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Beaumont Enterprise
BP announced Tuesday it plans to sell its Texas City and Carson, Calif. refineries, cutting its U.S. refining capacity in half.
Beaumont attorney Brent Coon, who represented plaintiffs in a lawsuit against BP after the company's 2005 Texas City refinery explosion, said it's not clear how the facility's ongoing probation status under a federal criminal settlement will impact the sale.
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Brent Coon & Associates Press Releases
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Sound Off Gulf Coast Oil Spill Sound off and give your opinion
Gladys
Thank God in heaven for Brent Coon & Associates. After the deaths of her parents, James and Linda Rowe, at a BP refinery in Texas City, Texas, on March 23, 2005, one 20-year old, Eva Rowe, took on BP with the help of Attorney Coon and his lawyers. I recently came across this article in the September 2007 issue of LADIES' HOME JOURNAL. In preparation for a possible case, Coon and his team called in 6 (six) million pages of documents from BP and began to sift through them. The BP documents showed that BP had not only ordered cost-cutting measures but had also literally calculated the relationship between paying for the loss of human life and making the necessary safety upgrades.
Donna
We can't count on our government to make BP accountable. I think that a class action suit, signed by US citizens aught to be filed against BP. A percentage of their profits yearly until this is cleaned up. What most people don't seem to understand is the oil extracted from the Gulf is sent overseas and not used in the US. But we will be expected to pay for it and that's if we don't turn our backs on them like we did in Alaska.
tom716
As long as corporations are people, then BP, Haliburton, and Transocean should be treated as such. They should be tried for gross negligence, manslaughter, and property damage, and given a corporate death penalty. Break em up and let someone who may be more responsible step in and take over. Our government did this routinely during the majority of the 19th century. Our founders felt that a corporation had to act in the common good of society and not do things to hurt society in any way. If they did they were essentially killed off. That was before corporations obtained "personhood" status from the 1886 supreme court case. Thomas Jefferson was right when he said one of the biggest threats was corporate power.
Ghostality
So the environment is severely damaged due to a CORPORATION who's main goal is obviously their financial bottom line. Then they play political hopscotch with those who question what they are doing.
HeraLynn
Shannon
Right now, I think we all need to focus on what we can do to help clean up the mess. Write your Congressmen and ask for better regulation of industries that can threaten the environment, and ask for forward movement on development of new energy sources and JOBS! Also, volunteer to go to the shores of Louisiana, Alabama and Florida to help clean birds and other wildlife. This will take an army of people - both to call their representatives and to roll up their sleeves and help clean!
pepegit
Maybe BP should focus its business on something literally "Beyond Petroleum" since it is obvious that they are incompetent oilfield operators.
Mike J.
BP and the industry are not going to be able to make a technical fix in time IMO. Someone needs to exercise some leadership and engage the Army Corps. of Engineers to build up a granite and cement reef and overlay this leak area. In 3 or 4 weeks time, all eyes will turn to the Army Corps of Engineers. I hope the ACOE gets the ball rolling by anticipating the call, has the barges, the cranes and materials ready to roll - BP has already admitted never coming up with a technical fix before at 5000 ft. depth. Since this is unprecedented, and we do not have time for lab experiments, bury this leak before we lose the entire Gulf. THIS IS THE ONLY RESPONSIBLE SOLUTION AT THIS POINT IN TIME. WE NEED SOME REAL LEADERSHIP from BP and the Industry to get this Done.
MrMagoo154
My calculator shows that 5000 barrels x 42 gals/barrel = 210,000 gallons per day, much more than the reporter states. This a serious problem folks and make shift solutions should have been proven to be effective decades ago. May God bless the coastal areas and fishing industry in the Gulf of Mexico.
Gates9
If anyone has any question of how evil, or at the very least completely morally devoid Big Oil and Big Finance have become;In the case of Baker v. Exxon, an Anchorage jury awarded $287 million for actual damages and $5 billion for punitive damages. The punitive damages amount was equal to a single year's profit by Exxon at that time. To protect itself in case the judgment was affirmed, Exxon obtained a $4.8 billion credit line from J.P. Morgan & Co. This in turn gave J.P. Morgan the opportunity to create the first modern CREDIT DEFAULT SWAP in 1994, so that J.P. Morgan would not have to hold so much money in reserve (8% of the loan under Basel I) against the risk of Exxon's default. Exxon has appealed several times and, through various supreme and appellate court rulings, reduced the damages to some $500 million plus interest. I don't know if they've paid up yet or not.
AlertSooner
Why do Government have to pay BP? Let BP empty their $$$ reserves. Let some investors in the oil industry loose some more money. The republicans who are always supporting oil industries ...........the tea baggers who think that they have all the knowledge in the world to make all the sound decisions and do not need Federal interference. AND invest in the oil industries understand how much it costs to clean the mess.
Well.....dear Ms Palin can donate some money to BP from her Book Sale for saving the Oil industry.....that will get her a new BP hat to help her vacation incognito!
Danick
The Gulf Coast just can't get a break. I grew up in Gulfport, Miss. and am so sad to see the turmoil that this area has been exposed to lately. Many people don't realize that this is the area that the eye passed over during Hurricane Katrina and receive the most wind and tidal surge damage, and now ...
The Gulf Coast just can't get a break. I grew up in Gulfport, Miss. and am so sad to see the turmoil that this area has been exposed to lately. Many people don't realize that this is the area that the eye passed over during Hurricane Katrina and receive the most wind and tidal surge damage, and now this. Lets see if FEMA can do a better job this time around
JackJason
BP has a moral climate of greed so entrenched throughout their corporate culture – it permeates their very soul. Texas City should has taught them a lesson – it didn’t.
AlertSooner
How come not a single media outlet is asking Sarah Palin's view about this? May be she is busy trying to call Joe-the Plumber to fix the under water valve.
Sound off and give your opinion
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Other Related BCA Websites
Texas City Explosion
Brent Coon & Associates has found the bombshells that have been making
international headlines and is releasing
them here at TexasCityExplosion.com
since January of 2007.
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Grill BP
Have a question for Brent Coon & Associates on the corporate greed of British Petroleum?
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BCA v BP
Profits over People? Not on our Watch. Visit our special BCA v BP website which is updated with all the information on Brent Coon and Associates' fight against corporate greed and unsafe practices.
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Additional Resource Libraries
Latest Gulf Coast
Lawsuit News
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| January 20, 2012, 11:39 pm |
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Notice the increase in BP commercials on television lately? You know, the ones that show pristine beaches, people gallivanting in the water, "locals" claiming that all is well in the Gulf following the devastating explosion and oil spill in April of 2010 that released 4.9 million barrels of crude oil and gas into the ocean, killing 11 and injuring 17 others while virtually shutting down the seafood industry in the area? The commercials that show BP employees rattling off a bunch of statistics about the improvements that have been made since the spill? These are the same employees that appear at black tie events exclaiming their company's commitment to communities and the environment.
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| January 16, 2012, 10:00 am |
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MOBILE, Alabama -- BP crews collected more than 3 tons of tarballs and buried tar mats from beaches in Alabama and Mississippi during the first 10 days of January.
Nearly two years after the BP spill, the company maintains a significant presence along the Alabama and Mississippi coastline, with dozens of workers patrolling the Gulf shoreline each week.
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| January 3, 2012, 11:19 pm |
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Company whose rig caused biggest oil spill in US history rewards executives for "best year in safety performance".
Transocean Ltd., the owner of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig that exploded off the Gulf of Mexico last year, has given its top executives bonuses for achieving the "best year in safety performance in our company's history'', despite the blast that killed 11 people and spilled 200 million gallons of oil into the ocean.
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| January 2, 2012, 10:29 am |
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In the middle of last year, Greenpeace submitted a string of Freedom of Information requests to US government agencies in relation to last year’s disastrous BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.
As a result the environmental group have obtained some 30,000 memos, emails and transcripts which document the worst oil spill in American history. Taking cues from WikiLeaks, Greenpeace has begun to leak its considerable cache online for all to see. Here’s what we pulled out of the document dump:
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| November 29, 2011, 10:02 am |
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LAFITTE, La. — The dock at Bundy’s Seafood is quiet, the trucks are empty and a crew a fraction of the normal size sits around a table waiting for something to do. But the most telling indicator that something is wrong is the smell. It smells perfectly fine.
“There’s no shrimp,” explained Grant Bundy, 38. The dock should smell like a place where 10,000 pounds of shrimp a day are bought off the boats. Not this year. In all of September, Bundy’s Seafood bought around 41,000 pounds.
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| October 13, 2011, 9:13 am |
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Wall Street Journal
WASHINGTON—U.S. offshore-drilling officials issued their first violations related to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill Wednesday, accusing BP PLC and two of its contractors of breaking several rules.
While citations against BP were widely expected, the government's decision to pursue the contractors Transocean Ltd. and Halliburton Co. for infractions jolted the contracting industry, which traditionally avoids liability in such accidents.
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| September 30, 2011, 11:20 am |
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Originally posted by New York Times - Jeremy Jacobs - September 29, 2011
An ongoing federal investigation into last year's massive rig explosion and oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico has found that a particularly lax U.S. regulatory regime was a significant factor in the events leading up to the disaster.
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| September 14, 2011, 10:39 am |
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BP, Transocean and Halliburton all violated federal safety regulations leading up to last year's Gulf of Mexico oil spill, a federal investigation concluded, in findings that could be crucial for the Justice Department investigation and numerous lawsuits surrounding the disaster.
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| September 14, 2011, 10:26 am |
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Federal investigators released their final report Wednesday on the causes of the Deepwater Horizon drilling-rig explosion in the Gulf of Mexico last year, castigating BP PLC and its contractors for risky decisions and criticizing the government for oversight gaps.
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| September 9, 2011, 10:21 am |
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Results from a study using acoustic technology to determine the amount of oil and natural gas released by the Deepwater Horizon spill matched the federal government’s estimates, validating the new measuring technique, researchers said.
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Environmental Concerns of the Gulf Coast Disaster
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| November 29, 2011, 10:02 am |
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LAFITTE, La. — The dock at Bundy’s Seafood is quiet, the trucks are empty and a crew a fraction of the normal size sits around a table waiting for something to do. But the most telling indicator that something is wrong is the smell. It smells perfectly fine.
“There’s no shrimp,” explained Grant Bundy, 38. The dock should smell like a place where 10,000 pounds of shrimp a day are bought off the boats. Not this year. In all of September, Bundy’s Seafood bought around 41,000 pounds.
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| June 9, 2011, 10:40 am |
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Federal and state agencies are investigating what the Coast Guard described as a brown “oily substance” in Breton Sound, raising fears among some Plaquemines Parish officials that oil from last year’s catastrophic BP spill still lingers in the Gulf of Mexico.
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| May 27, 2011, 10:44 am |
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MIAMI — The deaths of over 150 dolphins in the Gulf of Mexico so far this year is due in part to the devastating 2010 BP oil spill and the chemical dispersants used to contain it, a report said Thursday.
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| April 15, 2011, 12:26 pm |
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(Reuters) - BP Plc's 2010 oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico affected bird populations, sea turtles, fish, shellfish and some dolphin.
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| April 11, 2011, 3:34 pm |
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Scientists confirmed on Thursday that they have discovered oil on dead dolphins found along the U.S. Gulf Coast, raising fresh concerns about the effects of last year's BP oil spill on sea life.
Fifteen of the 406 dolphins that have washed ashore in the last 14 months had oil on their bodies, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration scientists said during a conference call with reporters.
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| February 3, 2011, 9:44 am |
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New York Times
The Gulf of Mexico should recover from the environmental damage caused by the enormous BP oil spill last year faster than many people expected, according to new estimates in reports commissioned by Kenneth R. Feinberg, the administrator of the $20 billion compensation fund.
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| June 7, 2010, 7:40 am |
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Bloomberg
By Mary Jane Credeur and Kim Chipman
June 5 (Bloomberg) -- More clumps of oil washed up on Florida’s Pensacola Beach overnight, and local officials said hotels and restaurants aren’t getting reservation phone calls as the BP Plc spill hits the state’s tourism industry.
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| May 24, 2010, 2:49 pm |
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Newsweek Web Exclusive
By Ian Yarett
The deep water of the ocean is the largest habitat on earth but it's also the least understood, making the effects of this deep-sea spill without precedent.
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| May 21, 2010, 1:41 pm |
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The Guardian
Suzanne Goldenberg
Local reports described heavy sheets of oil clogging marshes in Mississippi delta that provide haven for migratory birds
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| May 20, 2010, 8:38 am |
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By Times-Picayune Staff
Twice a day NOAA releases trajectory forecast maps predicting the extent and concentration of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill expected for the next 24, 48 and 72 hours. These are the latest maps.
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Gulf Coast Disaster Research and Statisitics
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