Deepwater Horizon Update July 8, 2010

Numbers to Date:

• BP's Tab= $3.12 billion
• Total Oil Spilled=up to 5 million barrels or 200,300,100 gallons (according to the government estimate of 60,000 barrels a day)
• Animals Collect Dead:
  Birds=1505
  Sea Turtles=447
  Mammals=54 (includes dolphins)

Government Will Try to Appeal Drilling Moratorium Today
Government lawyers will be in a federal appeals court in New Orleans today, fighting to reinstate a six-month moratorium on deepwater drilling. The temporary ban—put in place by President Obama, was overturned last month by a federal judge on the grounds that the government hadn't proved that the economic damage inflicted on the drilling industry by a moratorium was worth the potential safety problems of continued exploration. Administration lawyers will be heard before a three-judge this afternoon at the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals.

Tar balls from Gulf disaster reach Lake Pontchartrain
Tar balls linked to the worst oil spill in U.S. history have reached into Louisiana's Lake Pontchartrain and hit the beaches near Galveston, Texas, authorities in those states reported on day 77 of the disaster.

Easterly winds and high waves drove blobs of weathered oil up into the eastern end of the lake, which sits north of New Orleans. Experts estimated the amount of oil that has reached the lake at less than 100 barrels, with no hydrocarbon smell. The tar balls are the size of a silver dollar, some larger.

Oil Reaches Texas Beaches
In Texas, about 400 miles west of the ruptured offshore well the total volume of tar balls found over the weekend amounted to about five gallons. authorities weren't sure how they made it that far, tests confirmed that at least the first batch collected came from the Deepwater Horizon spill.