Comments on: Nuke the Gulf oil leak?

By: JamesPadraicR

JamesPadraicR — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

The Soviets weren't the only ones with other uses for nukes. Check out Operation Plowshare. Fun stuff like trying to release natural gas in Colorado, except the gas was too radioactive to use.

By: SkullHyphy

SkullHyphy — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

I’m not a nuclear weapons or engineering expert, but it seems to me that a nuke would blow open the oil vent and cause it to spew radioactive oil everywhere even faster.

By: Jeff

Jeff — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

That’s more like a nuclear charge in a deep and pretty insulated well couple of miles away not a bombing of some point on the gulf floor. The shift of a ground layers caused by explosion will close the (previously drilled) channel from the oil field feeding the gusher.
Might work.

By: rebdav

rebdav — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

So it is probably not the best way to fix this, but for amazing fireworks finales, engineering charges, and of course hordes of nazi zombies that I think it might be useful to have a few Davy Crockett rounds and the bazooka launcher. My father had a friend in the US air force at the publicity stunt where they popped an AIR-2 Genie anti bomber formation nuclear missile overhead, it uses the same warhead as the Davy Crockett. Really I just want to be a recognized nuclear power like the crazy Eskimo in Snow Crash.
As long as we are going to be nuking stuff and chucking the test ban treaty out anyone up for using some of the retired nukes building a giant project orion spaceship?

By: Tristan

Tristan — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Somebody set up us the bomb

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

When the gas lines on my car spring a leak I screw a metal screw into the end of the tube.. this really works,could this be done with a larger screw to slow the leak?

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Every fisherman in the Gulf with a boat should be given a centrifuge and empty barrels by BP and then paid $50 for every barrel of crude oil that they retrieve and return to BP.

By: Thebes

Thebes — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Not an idea I like.
But then I don’t like the idea of the Gulf becoming a dead zone for the next century or so either.

Frankly, if its done it will be hushed up. All we’ll know is that they “got the preventer unstuck” or something like it. Horrid PR even if it is, eventually, the best choice.

By: jacques45

jacques45 — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

How effective would a nuke even be, considering how much shielding from the pressures at 5k feet would be needed? Not that I’m against the idea – if it would do less damage than say, 2 more months of oil pouring out while BP sits and rotates, I’d be easily persuaded.

By: Brother Phil

Brother Phil — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

They don’t actually close the well with high explosives in a blow-out; they just use them to blow out the fire.

Red Adair is/was one of the best known technicians who specialise(d) in this. Essentially, you get a drum of TNT, wrap it in insulation, point a hose at it to keep it from cooking of prematurely, then get it up close to the well and blow it.

Hopefully it blows out the fire, and you can then get at the well to cap it.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Lol. Amazing how even on Boing Boing one whacko post can get people to go like “Oh hey, this STUPID-ASS CRAZY IDEA is actually kinda logical, when you think of it, real long and superficially…”

To those here who have already convinced yourselves that the nuclear fallout “wouldn’t be so bad”, have you ever thought what the political, social and moral consequences are? Yeez.

By: Coxswain

Coxswain — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

if dropping a nuke on the leaking well is the only way to seal it, and the benefits (stopping oil leak) outweigh the environmental detriments, I’m all for it.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Allow the PM of Japan to push the button thereby making a sort of payback for us nuking them even though they really deserved it at then time. :-)

By: Ultan

Ultan — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

That should be “Nuke the Gay Whales for Jesus”, per a mid-’80s bumper sticker I saw in Austin.

By: blackanvil

blackanvil — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Considering that, as JamesPadraicR points out, the last time we tried something like this the radioactive contamination rendered the field in question unusable, I have to ask if this approach have a similar impact?

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Extinguishing and evacuating at once…people in New Orleans can ride the surf all the way up to Arkansas.

By: spot-ffm

spot-ffm — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Sending nukes for clear water? General Ripper WAS right after all…

By: JayByrd

JayByrd — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Brought to you by the same folks who thought invading Iraq was the way to get bin Laden.
Shock & Awe!

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Nuking the sea floor might work but taking off and nuking it from orbit is the only way to be sure

By: Boomshadow

Boomshadow — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Strange–he never mentions this during his stage act. (Yes, I know that’s not the same Teller, but I couldn’t resist.)

Seriously, are they trying to turn this into a Bruce Willis movie?

By: Brainspore

Brainspore — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

See, nuclear energy IS the solution for our oil problems.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

I had actually thought about this exact thing. They use high explosives to cap off an oil fire, so why not use them for this?

By: MrScience

MrScience — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

I actually made this recommendation on Monday, but posted anonymously to avoid ridicule. :)
http://www.boingboing.net/2010/05/10/bp-continues-kludgey.html#comment-783823

By: The Chemist

The Chemist — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

So all of our non-radioactive fuel-air bomb and bunker-buster technology can’t be applied here?

Tactical nukes have already been replaced to my understanding.

(I am not a weapons buff.)

By: Dewi Morgan

Dewi Morgan — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Everyone keeps going on about how we need more green fuels, and then when someone finally comes up with an idea that GIVES us glowing green fuel, people treat it like a joke :(

By: aldasin

aldasin — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Reminiscent of the Simpsons episode where Homer gets a gun and proceeds to use it for everything around the house, including opening his beer.

By: Michael Smith

Michael Smith — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

#13,

Good to keep your Impulses under Control though.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Why not a GPS-guided conventional bunker-buster instead?

By: sapere_aude

sapere_aude — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Right now, nuking the oil leak would violate several arms control treaties (e.g. the Partial Test Ban Treaty, the Peaceful Nuclear Explosions Treaty, the Seabed Treaty), which would mean that the U.S. would have to either: (a) unilaterally violate all of those treaties, or (b) negotiate a special exemption to each of these treaties for this one emergency case (which would likely take many months of negotiations at the very least). Neither option is good.

Also, if they nuke it, it might contaminate the oil, rendering it unusable (which is why the U.S. abandoned the idea of using nukes to stimulate oil fields back in the 1960s).

Nuking it clearly has to be an absolute last resort, to be used only if it is determined that there is no other possible way to stop the leak.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

I think some well placed explosives could easily shut off the leaking oil. However, BP is not considering this because they want to save the well. They have a lot of money invested in this well and they don’t want to lose it. Bastards.