A massive blimp is expected to arrive in the Gulf Coast on Tuesday to help clean up the disastrous oil spill that's deposited tar balls on Texas shores.
The 178-foot-long U.S. Navy airship will be used to detect oil, direct skimming ships and look for threatened wildlife, reports CNN, adding it can stay aloft longer than helicopters and can survey a wider area.
 By Joe Raedle, Getty Images |
Rough seas have hampered cleanup efforts and tests by A Whale, a converted Taiwanese oil tanker touted as the world's largest skimmer. The 1,100-foot-long ship, which swallows water with oil then separates it, can reportedly skim up to 50,000 barrels of oil daily.
Yet tests from its weekend oil-skimming remained "inconclusive" because of the rough waters, the vessel's owner TMT Shipping Offshore said Monday in a statement, reports CNN, which says the U.S. Coast Guard will extend its testing period through Thursday.
While those tests were ongoing, tar balls washed ashore in Texas, the first evidence that crude from BP's Macondo well that began gushing April 20 has now reached all Gulf states.
 By Jennifer Reynolds, AP |
A Coast Guard official said it's possible that the oil was carried by a ship, not by ocean currents, to the barrier islands of the eastern Texas coast, but there was no way to know for sure, reports the Associated Press.
The Texas amount is tiny in comparison to the oil that's reached the hardest-hit parts of the Gulf coast in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and the Florida Panhandle, yet Texas officials reacted swiftly, AP reports.
"Any Texas shores impacted by the Deepwater spill will be cleaned up quickly and BP will be picking up the tab," Texas Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson said in a news release.
About five gallons of tar balls were found Saturday on the Bolivar Peninsula, northeast of Galveston, said Capt. Marcus Woodring, the Coast Guard commander for the Houston/Galveston sector, reports AP, adding another two gallons were found Sunday on the peninsula and Galveston Island although tests have not yet confirmed their origin.
Fuente: usatoday.com
