Re: Keep Chins Up
by capthoop on Wed May 19, 2010 9:37 pm

Today I was assigned to go to the west looking for oil with Chief Evans aboard. We ran out of tiger pass and made a large loop covering many rigs about 15 miles offshore looking for any trace of oil. We asked a captain that works a crew boat in that area and he said "A little came through a few days ago but nothing since". That may have gone tothe west and been found west of Grand Aisle. After running several rigs and looking hard for a trace we found no trace of any oil. On some of the rigs large schools of fish came up to greet the boat. I saw angle fish and trigger fish as well as an occasional mangrove snapper. We then went into the Empire jetties and found about 3 to 5 rocks with a (possable trace) of residue oil. If it was it was already captured and was of no threat to anybody or thing. From there we worked the coast west untill we could see the buildings on Grand Isle. We were not given any coordinates so we made sure we at least covered the parish boundaries. We saw several specks and reds being caught as we edged our way along the shoreline looking for the elusive west side oil. The state waters are opened to fishing on that side of the river to the parish lines. We had a close up look at the National Guard sandbaging the breaks in the land in the Scofield bay area. Wish we had more choppers to get it done faster. What they are doing is very effective. That area has to still be built up higher but it is a good start. We continued down the shore untill we were once again close to tiger pass. We came in red pass.

There is NO oil in the area we covered today and I expressed the fact that the area being closed to fishing should not be set at federal and state lines but at a more realistic Lat/Lon coridinate giving us a fair way to control our livelyhood. The Empire loop area may be a place that oil will never reach.

I am in favor of a charter captains fish testing group that catches and marks location of fish caught so they can be tested for the safety of the public. This can be done on the days they are not tasked by other groups.

Would like to see an area about 20 miles from shore opened from south west pass to close to Grand Aisle.. The area is clean.

Life is Good!

Capt Hoop
Our Freedom

That sounds like a good idea - is anyone pitching that ?



Hoop - IMO - one of the huge challenges the gulf region will face after the leak is stopped is the understanding of what is clean. I suspect the pelagic species will be back in heartbeat. Clearly the dispersants have worked very well in limiting the damage from the mechanical impacts caused by the oil slicks.

The tricky part will be figuring out the fate, transport and food chain accumulation dynamics (if any) of the oil (and dispersants) that is sub surface and getting into the food chain through plankton and bait species (if any). This will be a huge challenge for the shrimpers and inshore guys.

Good luck - your posts are much appreciated.

Without getting political - I hope everyone understands that if we as a nation want to get away from these risky drilling practices - it all starts with the person in the mirror.

What a world we live in . . . we can stream live video of the leak to the world over the internet . . . . . . . . . . we just can't stop it !

As Old School says . . . "We have really spit the bit"

LArry it was GREAT to talk with you last night,...the circumstances couldn't suck anymore,..but still nice to hear the actual story,...as always,..in our hearts and minds.........

Sure BP and its sub contractors are to be blamed, but what about the colossal failure of our federal government to something (anything) other than investigating and laying blame? This is getting ridiculous. 45 days in (roughly) and we announce that we are "not sure" BP can handle this problem? No ***** sherlock.