Disasters

"The story of the last cataclysmic American oil spill has evolved over time into a straightforward tale of cause and effect.... A commission that investigated the Alaska spill found that oil companies cut corners to maximize profits. Systems intended to prevent disaster failed, and no backups were in place. Regulators were too close to the oil industry and approved woefully inadequate accident response and cleanup plans. History is repeating, say officials who investigated the Valdez, because the lessons of two decades ago remain unheeded."

"As it works to reshape the oil industry's image, American Petroleum Institute's media shop has nabbed a former spokesman for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce."

BP and the Coast Guard, after months of blocking news media from covering the Gulf spill, say they have gone straight. One whistleblower who used to help them block TV coverage is now telling all.

"Before a fillet of grouper, fresh oyster or piece of shrimp from the Gulf of Mexico lands in the grocery seafood aisle, state and federal agencies have weighed in on its safety. ... However, no one is testing seafood to tell whether it has absorbed the toxic compounds found in the nearly 1.8 million gallons of dispersants BP has poured into the water to break up the oil."

"The plan to start choking off oil gushing into the Gulf of Mexico was suddenly halted as government officials and BP said further analysis must be done Wednesday before critical tests could proceed."

A billion-dollar BP oil rig named Thunder Horse almost sunk in the Gulf after a 2005 hurricane. "The problems at Thunder Horse were not an anomaly, but a warning that BP was taking too many risks and cutting corners in pursuit of growth and profits, according to analysts, competitors and former employees. Despite a catalog of crises and near misses in recent years, BP has been chronically unable or unwilling to learn from its mistakes, an examination of its record shows."

The co-chairmen of a presidential commission probing the BP oil spill did not ask any probing questions of the one BP exec to testify at the panel's first hearing Monday.

"The Coast Guard has modified a policy on safety zones around boom deployed on oiled coastlines, a policy news organizations had said unnecessarily restricted coverage of the impact of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill and efforts to clean it up."

"Interior Secretary Ken Salazar  issued revised rules on Monday for a six-month moratorium on deepwater oil  drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, replacing an earlier one that had been declared invalid by federal courts."