Monday, June 28, 2010

BP Oil Hits Pensacola

The once white sand beaches of Pensacola are now brown. Though the Florida tourist commission keeps hitting the airwaves telling people the beaches are fine, the truth of the matter is something completely different.






That line of brown? It's oil 6 inches down. It came in with the tide and was buried by sand. The crews working to clean up the beaches are getting the larger tar balls but their sifters are allowing smaller particles to return to the sand. And deeper down, this oil remains untouched.

What it comes down to is this - we, as a species, cannot completely remove the oil from these beaches.  It's impossible. Mother Nature will eventually take care of this but she works on a completely different time scale. In a few thousand years, this oil may be removed with the wave action. For now, and for the foreseeable future, it will be present. Just a few inches below the surface.

If you want to see more desecration, head over to the St Petersburg Times photo blog.  H/T to Joe.My.God.

2 comments:

SCG said...

BP gave us $25 million to convince everyone to come to our beaches because they were "safe". Our legislature kept screaming at Gov. Crist to get the money, spend the dollars to promote tourism. We aren't fooled here... and neither is anyone else. I think the $25 million would have been better spent on the people currently being put out of business, and the wildlife/sealife that are dying. But I digress...

Stacy Hackenberg said...

Thanks for clarifying. I've been watching the ads for the gulf coast states and wondering how they could possibly think anyone was fooled. Now, I see. Money talks.