Timmy Couvillion's invention is helping contain a 14-year gulf oil spill

[thackney]

Timmy Couvillion's invention is helping contain a 14-year gulf oil spill
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2019/national/couvillion-gulf-oil-spill-containment/?utm_term=.4ee140550db0

...A hole as wide as a basketball court had opened on the sea floor and thousands of gallons of Louisiana sweet crude gushed through. Amberjack, a popular sport fish, meandered through millions of toxic oil bubbles rising through the dark water. “We saw a volcano coming up,” Couvillion recalled in a recent interview. “I had no idea it was that bad.”...

...His business, the Couvillion Group, conceived and designed a containment system weighing more than 200 tons, built it in shops all over southern Louisiana and pieced it together deep underwater. The system has recovered about 63,000 gallons since March, according to Couvillion — virtually eliminating a rainbow-colored slick that has stretched as far as 21 miles....

...In three months, his containment unit had brought 400 workers, three oceangoing ships and numerous barges to clean up the spill. But the most impressive thing, say Luttrell and others, is how the contraption was conceived, designed, built, shipped to the gulf, lowered overboard and pieced together by nine divers working eight-hour shifts at the bottom of the ocean....

...“What went right is that we’re collecting 1,200 gallons of oil a day that’s not going into the Gulf of Mexico,” Kennelley said. “Something had to be done, man.”...

[IsailedawayfromFR]

It is a difficult job to capture oil like this fella is doing.  Kudos to him.

I would point out that this appears sensationalistic journalism.  Speaking in gallons instead of barrels demonstrates either a lack of oil industry knowledge or a desire to make volumes appear greater than they are.  As a so-called environmental journalist, this author's entire resume speaks volumes indeed on these desires.  https://www.washingtonpost.com/people/darryl-fears/?utm_term=.2f39713d5e14

And calling it a spill?  This was a natural disaster.  Not a malicious endeavor.   I call it a seep like the many prevalent around the world.

Most of the time oil produced in the Gulf has few heavy ends so it dissipates without undue environmental effects, especially with this type of water depth.  Proof is Amberjack remain swimming nearby the seep even after 14 years.  The Gulf would be littered with dead fish bodies over such a prolonged period if indeed it were poisonous to them.

[Elderberry]

Taylor oil spill

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taylor_oil_spill

The 2004 Taylor oil spill is an ongoing spill located in the Gulf of Mexico, around 11 miles (18 km) off the coast of the U.S. state of Louisiana, which resulted from the destruction of a Taylor Energy oil platform during Hurricane Ivan. It was first brought to public attention when the contamination at the site was noticed in 2010 by those monitoring the nearby Deepwater Horizon oil spill. A later report by the Associated Press in 2015 challenged the estimates of the extent of the leak given by the company and the U.S. Coast Guard, which were then revised to be around 20 times greater than initially reported.

Upper estimates of the spill have been calculated to be as much as 1,400,000 US gallons (5,300,000 l; 1,200,000 imp gal) of oil lost over the life of the disaster, affecting an area as large as 8 square miles (21 km2). As of 2018 it was estimated that 300 to 700 barrels of oil per day are being spilled, making it one of the worst modern oil spills in the Gulf of Mexico by volume. The reserves are likely sufficient for the spill to continue for up to 100 years if not contained.

Taylor Energy has spent as much as $435 million or more decommissioning the site. They contend that nothing further can be done to contain the spill, and that current observations of oil plumes in the area are the result of contaminated sediments, and not an active spill. This has been contradicted by the reports of non-profit groups, the press, and the government

[Smokin Joe]

Divide all those reports in gallons by 42 to get the number of stock tank barrels (standard measure of oil volume). The gallons figures are more impressive for those who don't know anything about the industry, especially when you consider 1,000,000 gallons only reads as 23,810 barrels of oil (rounding that last half barrel up to a full one).

To put that in perspective, 700 barrels fill a standard oil shipment rail car, (DOT-111 tank car, specification 111A100W1), so just over 34 rail cars will hold a million gallons. 
That's a short train leaving these parts (Williston Basin), where some 1300 rail cars full of crude leave daily, mostly from the Bakken and Three Forks formations.