Here’s a short film by Shaun Clark that was submitted by Mew Lab to Candlelight’s Vimeo short film group. Mysterious and dark. I like those hands a lot. My favorite shot is the hand in the candle flame.
My Plug Idea #2 for the BP Oil Spill
Another idea for plugging the hole in the Gulf in a relatively short time.
The drawings are of course not done to scale. They are conceptual.
I suspect that BP engineers are totally focused on using the existing blowout prevention machine that is not working as the main part of their fix. Consequently, their thinking is running along the lines of what the machine’s capacities and weaknesses are. This may prevent them from thinking ‘outside the blowout preventer,’ so to speak. There should be some engineers spending their time thinking of the problem as if there were no blowout preventer at all. Just an open pipe in a hole with lots of pressure spewing out hot oil and gas. How would you plug that?
I might plug it with a huge concrete and steel cap weight that had a perforated pipe extending from beneath it. The weight and its extending perforated pipe would be slowly lowered over the gusher hole. The perforated pipe would slide inside the gushing well pipe until the huge cap weight above was sitting on the ocean floor. Then cement could be pumped from the surface down a long pipe which would connect to the giant cap weight and its perforated pipe now sitting inside the well pipe. The cement would push down this pipe extension and out through the perforations to plug up the well pipe.
I wonder if this idea holds any merit at all. Perhaps the best part of the idea is for engineers to consider options outside of the blowout preventer.
Obama Has Ignored His Basic Responsibility to Protect the United States
President Barack Obama has failed to uphold the primary duty of the President of the United States, which is to protect it from physical harm. This president has inexplicably ignored his responsibilities and has turned over a planetary mega-disaster to the foreign oil company that caused the disaster. The total reliance upon a company that has proven itself incapable of planning for problems with underwater oil wells is an abdication of responsibility, a total loss of control and a political nightmare that will effectively end the Obama presidency. If you are a Democrat, as I am, you had better watch the video below. When James Carville, one of the great Democrats and political strategists of the 20th century screams at you this way, with this much anger and this much disbelief, you are a lame-duck president. Doesn’t matter how well you smile. Watch:
Carville is on the money. Obama should have immediately recognized that this hole in the Gulf is a very bad Chernobyl-level disaster that is going to wipe out the southern coast of the United States and possibly kill most life in the Gulf of Mexico. He should have set up an emergency command center in Louisiana at which he was present and he should have put the military at the site of the disaster so that they could use cameras and submarines to keep an eye on what British Petroleum was doing at the well head. There is no reason to believe what BP is telling the U.S. government. There is no reason to believe that they are actually trying a ‘top-kill’ procedure. There is no visual evidence of this and the U.S. military would be able to verify or refute the company’s claims.
The BP oil spill is a Chernobyl-level disaster. It is ongoing and will kill enormous stretches of coastline and turn large portions of the Gulf into dead zones. It will also kill human beings. BP is putting people out into poisonous waters without any Hazmat breathing gear. Those people are starting to get sick already. The poisons can destroy brain tissue and apparently damage lungs.
Fisherman hired to help clean up are getting sick from chemicals at oil spill:
President Obama has failed to put sufficient resources along the coasts to help with cleanup. Instead, he maneuvers politically by sending 1,200 National Guard troops to help ‘protect’ the border in Arizona when everyone knows that those troops cannot do anything at all but stand around and drink coffee. It is not legal for them to arrest anyone crossing the border and they are not authorized to do so. But they could certainly help down in Louisiana with oil.
Obama has decided to visit the area on Friday. So he can have a look. Why doesn’t he put his head into the thick sloppy goop that will be surrounding his boat. When he comes up he’ll be a well-oiled president machine.
This is a very weak president. He does not have the ability to move quickly – in real time – during an extended crisis. It is appalling that he has not been able to overcome his inertia over the course of an entire month of unfolding disaster. If I were an enemy of the United States, I would be paying very close attention to what is going on here and make my move right about now. Like North Korea.
What we find out later about this oil spill will make today’s anger seem mild. Never again will I be misled by a politician who paints himself as a hero to the people. Never. We were all so excited about having a woman candidate in the primaries and a black candidate in the presidential election. But those things really aren’t important enough. We feel proud for electing the nation’s first black president but look what it got us. It got us a corporate middle manager who gives billions to Wall Street friends, turns healthcare reform into a windfall for the insurance companies, continues two useless and expensive wars, continues to hold people in prisons without charges, and cannot figure out how to take control during a horrendous man-made disaster.
Film: Nadja in Paris
French New Wave directory Eric Rohmer made this 1964 short film about a woman who is a student in Paris and likes to walk around exploring the city and herself. Incredible simplicity.
Part 2:
My Plug Idea for the BP Oil Spill
Plug the hole with a big… you know… plug. There are no ideas coming out of the U.S. government or its bosses at British Petroleum, so why not offer some of our own. I’m pretty good at offering lots of dumb ideas while trying to find a single good one. So here’s my latest dumb idea.
To modify my idea in the film slightly, I would guess that instead of dropping the plug from chains, you would set the thing down on short legs at the ocean floor and then, when it was aligned with the hole, blow the legs out from under it to drop it into the hole.
I wonder if there are lots of ideas like this for solving the disaster in the Gulf. I’d be very curious to see what other people are coming up with.
Update:
After posting my doomsday hole plug idea last night, Scot Monette wrote me a note to point me to this video for his oil spill cleanup product, Petronet. It’s a biodegradable cellulose fiber made from ground up garbage. It’s environmentally friendly and it absorbs huge amounts of oil. When a country gets into a situation where it can only elect intellectual midgets to the highest federal offices (yes, I’m referring to our dimwitted President), you need people like this who are thinking on their feet and use their ingenuity to actually make things that help. Look at this video and ask yourself why the Coast Guard is not on the phone with Mr. Monette at this very moment:
Audio Podcast Novel: Robinson Crusoe (Part 11)
DOWNLOAD ROBINSON CRUSOE – PART 11
Crusoe makes another shocking discovery and sets himself on a course of action that leads him to one of the book’s most interesting passages. It is here, in Crusoe’s struggle with his own outrage and his ideas about what makes for civilized behavior, that Defoe begins to turn the novel in a new direction. He is examining the underpinnings of Western civilization. What makes a person civilized? What does the right of self defense really mean? This kind of thinking and questioning is perhaps somewhat lacking in certain countries today. Notice also how religion, for Crusoe, seems to have a moderating, calming influence. He resists using it to justify himself or his actions.
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Read by Alessandro Cima
Illustration is by NC Wyeth (1920)
Crusoe watches the ocean for boats
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