Thursday, July 15, 2010

The Human Toll

I am hearing reports from multiple areas along the Coast that people are falling ill due to the oil spill. Some of those reports are quite harrowing, and rumors are starting to swirl of evacuations being planned in coastal areas of Alabama and Grand Isle. I suspect much of it is disaster porn egged on by carpetbloggers, but I know that a lot of folks who are working on the spill are starting to show signs of some serious health issues.

Here is an interview LEAN shot with one of the workers:



Folks...I would not take a job cleaning up this spill. I realize someone has to do it, but if BP is not providing or even allowing people to wear protective gear to perform the work....fuck it. As Kellie stated in the video...$12/hour is not worth your life. This is bullshit.

I was told from a VERY reliable source that some independent contractors are being hired to perform air quality tests by private entities. One of the contractors was working with his daughter and after they ran two tests on the Alabama shoreline they packed up their gear, called the client and told him they were leaving the area and would not be able to complete the job. That's pretty scary shit.

I think Tony Hayward should be required to move his entire family to Dauphin Island or to Grand Isle until this disaster is officially over.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Kellie Fellows is a brave woman for taking that job.

It is also brave of her to quit given how close to homelessness she is.

I hope she and her daughter will make it somehow.

Thanks for sharing the video.

After watching it, I sat and thought about jobs I've worked that involved dangerous substances. Safety regulations are talked about, but routinely not honored.

If you try to abide by them yourself, or try to make following the policy into the daily practice, you can end up feeling like Serpico.

The stay or move questions will keep coming. If you've got kids, things get simpler.

It is your most important job to protect your kids. Even Kindra moved her kids. Kellie Fellows quit a job she badly needs to try to ensure she will be around to raise her daughter.

No place, no job, will ever be more important to me than my child.

Anonymous said...

I am reminded of that video with Kindra Arnesen, talking about her kids, where she noticed rashes on their skin. She left the Gulf Coast to take a break and their rashes healed, until they went back home and the rashes came back. The frustrating thing about all of this is how there have been so many lies and half-truths involving this entire mess, told by BP, the government, more or less everyone involved that now when an official says anything is okay, safe, fixed, what have you, persistent doubts occur and are not easily remedied.

Editilla said...

Thanks, Man.
Here is a site for EPA data sets that a reporter friend of mine sent me, this one for Air Sampling:
http://www.socrata.com/Government/EPA-Air-Sampling-Response-to-BP-Oil-Spill/498c-fwrs
--yet there are others:
http://www.socrata.com/profile/U-S-Environmental-Protection-Agency/yahm-crqu
I don't know if you gotta sign in to see these, but it is worth it.
My reporter friend was on Grand Terre and Queen's Isl the day after Van Heerden made his first famous OVERSTATED Statement... and she continued to move around the area on the water documenting what she saw: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/georgianne-nienaber/doomed-pelicans-british-p_b_604612.html
Then she got sick, almost unable to drive due to the vertigo, the constant headaches, so she had to leave the area and seek medical convalescence. She is determined to be back in the Atchafalaya before the next storm.
I will say this again, in the absence of a Free Press there is no Crying Wolf but only the Silence of the Lambs.
Thanks again for this post.
We got you hangin'5X5.

Editilla said...

Well, lo and behold, here is my reporter friend today:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/georgianne-nienaber/mikulski-slams-epa-on-dis_b_648611.html
You will find the same data sets linked in her exhaustive article.
Thanks again.

Anonymous said...

I laughed at the "this is how you get superpowers" guy.

Way to whistle past a graveyard.

Editilla~New Orleans Ladder said...

Anon, hehehe, I haven't heard "Whistling past a Graveyard" in a while.
True'dat.