Francis Meyrick

Eco Boom-Boom 1) Meyrickpedia: Eco Boom-Boom = an extreme environmentalist article of Absolute Faith, not necessarily supported by bothersome Facts

“SO WHERE IS THE OIL SPILL? “

“So where is the oil spill? “
“So where is all the oil? “

As helicopter pilots, we got used to the question.
We heard it hundreds of times.
Puzzled front seat passengers would ask it, within a few minutes of crossing the coast outbound.
“So where is the oil spill? “
Their gaze would be sweeping the horizon, puzzled. They seemed to have been expecting a silent vast expanse of black crude, floating ominously for hundreds of miles in all directions.
“So where is the oil spill? “
“Where is all the oil? “
They might as well have added: “we know it’s here, we’ve seen it all on the telly. It’s been never-ending, non-stop, around the world headlines…. but WHERE is it? “

There are many different helicopter companies, all serving the Oil Patch, but as pilots we tend to socialize across all party lines. Everybody has friends working elsewhere, and the wry humor quickly seized on the monumental political over-play. That it was (and continues to be…)…

a massive political football…

…from a very early stage on, on that issue, few of us soon had any doubts.

The cold hard fact was that ‘everybody and his Granny’ with a political/environmental axe to grind, was leaping on the bandwagon, sticking his ugly face on television, and spouting rabid nonsense and hatred.
anti-Oil…
anti-BP…
anti-Big Business…
anti-Bush… (does that poor guy even sleep at night?)
anti-Republican…

Consider if you will, that this humble scribe, along with countless other little helicopter drivers, was working overtime like the proverbial clappers. On a nominal seven days on and seven days off schedule, that soon became, after the Deepwater Horizon explosion, more like eleven days on and three days off.
And I was flying A LOT. Along with my colleagues, I had a grand stand view of the whole proceedings.
I don’t presume to speak for anybody else. But this, for better or worse, is a record of what I saw:

1) The Coastguard in the first few days produced information, in perfect sincerity, (as we have grown to expect from that worthy organization), that was based on observation, wind, and tidal considerations. What they drew on a chart of the Gulf of Mexico represented the furthest most likely area that some oil might have reached. In other words, they drew a large area, covering thousands and thousands of square miles, WITHIN WHICH you had the possibility of finding oil.
(Here’s a football field. We have lost some tortoises within that football field. Be on the lookout for them)
That oil might be in a slick several miles square (in the very early days), or just in blotches a few hundred yards long. Whatever. But within that indicated area (which of course grew larger as time went by, and wind and currents took effect) , the Coast guard was saying you might find oil.

The Coastguard NEVER said:

“THIS IS THE OIL SPILL “.

(that above mentioned football field is not ‘one giant tortoise’ which we have lost)

(sigh)
Enter…
(Blast of Trumpets) (tattarrattaaaataaaaaaAAAAA!)
…..(God help us working class bums in the Oil Patch)
THE SO-CALLED LIBERAL MEDIA!!!
And it’s been downhill ever since.

Aside from my frequent complaint that there is nothing “liberal ” (or indeed, “Progressive “) about these clowns and masters of SPIN and DISTORTION…
Aside from my frequent complaint that most of them never seem to have read a decent book on Economics, Free Market Theory or History…
(and it often shows in outrageous distortions and hilarious statements)…
What really ticks me off is how narrow minded, shallow, and non-compassionate these Talking Heads have been towards the hundreds of thousands of people who depend for their immediate pay checks on the Oil Patch. Whether in Oil and Gas directly, or in service industries or industries supporting the service industries. It doesn’t matter. They are ALL in one sense or another OIL and GAS WORKERS.
(And entitled to proudly fly this bumper sticker!)

The Talking Heads and the Flashing Legs decided this was WONDERFUL MATERIAL.
As they drove to work in their flashy cars… (Oil!), (),
wearing designer clothes…(Oil!), ()
enjoying their air conditioning,(Oil!)… ()
applying make up… (Oil!) ()
carrying in their plastic shopping bags… (Oil!) ()
flashing their plastic credit cards…. (Oil!) ()

…they positively drooled with anticipated delight at the podium they could now solemnly mount… (Oil!) ()
Mournfully, sadly, or blazingly angrily, they could denounce the worst ecological disaster ever. (Is it?) (I don’t think so – at all) One worthy LA University Professor of Political Economy (suddenly apparently promoted to Oil Sciences and Environmental Science Professor) was just one of the many hacks given unlimited television air time, to spout (complete with theatrical rage and gnashing teeth) his speechless fury at BP, Big Oil, and the unprecedented assault on Louisiana’s coastline by all those anarchistic vandals in the Oil Patch. The damn OIL TRASH down there.
I certainly felt he was addressing me as well, as a scurrilous Oil Patch Worker, so I hereby return the compliment. (By the way, Sir, do you wear clothes? Drive a Car? Use plastic? Use Air Conditioning?)

(hypocrite…)

But far and and away the worst single manipulation, the worst single act of bamboozling the voting masses, was this little trick:

***The previous mentioned area indicated by the Coastguard (remember, the outermost limits of the area within which oil could be found)***

***was shaded in dramatically on ALL THE NEWS OUTLETS***

***and given the label…****

(you’ve guessed it!)

***THE OIL SPILL*** !!!

(Eco Boom-Boom No. 1)

Is it any wonder then, that Jo Public, sitting back aghast in their living room, horrified, has visions of oil slicks hundreds of miles long, hundreds of miles wide, sixteen-and-a-half inches thick, with a million pelicans, a million dolphins, five thousand whales, and one lonely Loch Ness Monster, struggling for survival???
This was NOT the Oil Spill. This was the outermost area WITHIN which….etc, etc.
A BIG (Huge!) difference!
NOTE: WITHIN that area it was possible to fly fifty, sixty, seventy miles without seeing ANY oil. Just waves. Then you would pass some nasty oil slicks. Then nothing again. At the very worst, immediately around the Deepwater Horizon site itself, you would meet some horrible slicks. But they soon started to disperse. Evaporation alone took care of massive amounts of it.
I emphasize: it was NEVER one MASSIVE oil spill covering hundreds or thousands of contiguous square miles, as drawn on the television screens across the world!
And that is why even seasoned Oil Patch veterans, sitting at home, got taken in by the Bally Hoop-La-la, and when they rode out again in a helicopter, would stare out the windscreen, and query in amazement:

“So where is the oil spill? “
“So where is all the oil? “

Yes, Media Spin at work. Jo Public, staring Goggle Eyed at the Box, lapping it all up in great gobs of Hype and Hysteria.

And of course, it only gets better…!

(to be continued tomorrow, with “Eco Boom-Boom No.2 “)

Keep Pushing Back!

Francis Meyrick

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Last edited by Francis Meyrick on September 23, 2010, 7:59 pm