Port Fourchon, Louisiana (CNN) – It sounds like a Hollywood movie. An impending disaster – think the disabled spacecraft in “Apollo 13” or the asteroid hurtling toward Earth in “Armageddon” – prompts a daring intervention by engineers to save the day.
The threat is real – oil gushing from a broken well on the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico that could destroy livelihoods and irreplaceable coastal wetlands.
Equally real is the attempted engineering marvel – a four-story metal container that will be lowered onto the leaking pipe to try to suck in the flowing oil.
They’re basically gonna just put a big box over it :mamoru:
all i can think of is a giant tampon, space balls style, being pulled out of a 100’ tampax wrapper, then the oil being sucked up by the statue of liberty with a vacuum cleaner. changing from suck, to blow. thanks fry :lol:
"If the tube doesn’t work, BP could try a second containment box, which would be placed over the well and also would siphon the oil to the surface.
In another experiment, BP might wind up shooting junk of all shapes and sizes to plug the nooks and crannies into the blowout preventer — a giant piece of machinery that’s allowing some of the oil to escape. In the aptly named “junk shot,” engineers would shoot pieces of tires, golf balls, knotted rope and other items into it in hopes the right size stuff makes its way to the appropriate holes. Once the leak is clogged, heavy mud will be poured in. It would then be sealed off with cement. "
I’m not entirely sure what the hell BP is doing here.
It has been historically shown that different size lead balls can be introduced into the system to plug mentioned holes. I don’t know why they are using “junk” lol.
“In hopes” is the last thing I want to hear about a prospective plan when dealing with something of this magnitude. :tdown: What the fuck are they doing out there?
