What are some of the challenges faced with the containment and cleanup of the Gulf coast oil disaster? And what are some ways we can help?

One of the great challenges that relief workers and clean-up personnel face in the BP Oil Spill gulf clean up is the established effects of exposure to toxic chemicals such as "oil, methane, benzene, hydrogen sulfide, other toxic gases and very poisonous chemical dispersant such as Corexit 9500. " Accordingly it has been reported by businessinsider.Com, that: -a large number of workers cleaning up the BP oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico report that they are suffering from flu-like symptoms. -exposure to the oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico has resulted in 162 cases of illnesses reported to the Louisiana state health department.

-400 people have sought medical care for upper or lower respiratory problems, headaches, nausea, and eye irritation after trips to Escambia County beaches. Furthermore, it has also been reported that "vast majority of those who worked to clean up the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska are now dead. " youtube.com/watch?v=eRrbqBEGxiw&feature=... And what are some of the ways we can help?

The best way to help in this major oil disaster is to give donations or become a volunteer and contact legitimate organizations how you can be of service. Big things happen from small beginnings. I suggest you visit the link below for the list of accredited NGO's to contribute your part: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2010/06/04/bp-oil-spill-aftermath-help/ Would pleading with the current US presidential administration to repeal The Jones Act help?

To allow skimmers and containment equipment in from up here in Canada? Repealing the The Jones Act, would greatly help in collecting oil spill spreading in the Gulf of Mexico, in the sense that there are hi-tech skimmers willing to lend a hand in the clean-up efforts. The only thing needed to be done is a political will from President Obama.

"Within a week of the explosion, 13 countries, including several European nations, offered assistance from vessels and crews with experience in removing oil spill debris, and as of June 21, the State Department has acknowledged that overall, ‘it has had 21 aid offers from 17 countries." How about donating equipment like cameras or volunteering if you live among the worst hit areas of this disaster? According to dailygreen.

Com, there are six ways to help, for citizens in the affected areas, and these are: 1. Inform authorities if you encountered sightings of affected wildlife and oil contaminated beaches. " * To report oiled wildlife: 1-866-557-1401 (Leave a message; they will be checked hourly.

) * To report oil spill related damage: 1-800-440-0858 * To report oiled shoreline: 1-866-448-5816" 2. Volunteer, several volunteer organizations are on the ground in the affected areas such as Tristate Bird Rescue & Research, National Audubon Society and contact this "volunteer hotline at 1-866-448-5816. " 3.

Donate, to the following organizations listed below: -National Audubon Society -National Wildlife Federation -Greater New Orleans Foundation -Matter of Trust -Manomet Center 4. Patronize gulf of Mexico seafood, "You have to be careful that you can trust the source is uncontaminated, but remember that the western Gulf of Mexico remains open to fishing, as do some state waters that haven't been threatened by oil. " 5.

Send letters to local and national leaders, in order to pressure them to change the current energy policy.6. Reduce or shun the utilization of fossil fuel, and "support comprehensive energy legislation that will move the nation from a dependence on fossil fuels like oil and coal to more renewable energy technologies, like wind, solar and geothermal. " 7.

Be part of the movement to boycott BP, by joining the growing list of people on Facebook, urging citizens to boycott the company.

We must be pretty desperate to go to such lengths to get this stuff called oil. Why? Why are we in Iraq?

Why did we call it "Operation Iraqi Freedom? " Are we really there to secure the freedom of the Iraqis or are we there because they have the largest oil deposits in the world? Why are we in Afghanistan?

Why is it called "Operation Enduring Freedom"? Are we really there to secure the freedom of the Afghans or are we there because of the oil? Now, Afghanistan does not have oil, but it will be the route for an important pipeline that will bring oil and gas from Turkmenistan on the Caspian Sea via Afghanistan to Pakistan and beyond to the lucrative markets of India, China and the rest of Asia.

Afghanistan lies at the crossroads, and until there is stability there, the pipelines through this country and neighboring countries cannot be built. It is all related to oil. So now what can you/we do in light of this information?

We need to curb our insatiable appetite for oil! We are addicted to the stuff like an addict to heroin. We just don't really know it.

For example, every calorie of food energy you consume, costs 10 calories of oil energy to produce. You thought that food is produced from photosynthesis from free energy provided by the sun. Not exactly.

Human beings already use 50% of the photosynthetic output of the entire earth, but this is not enough to feed the world. For an average American, it takes 400 gallons of oil equivalents each year to produce our food, 31% of that going into fertilizer production alone. Fertilizer is energy.(You've heard of fertilizer bombs, haven't you?) Without fertilizer produced by gas, and oil powered mechanized farming including mechanized irrigation, we would not be able to feed the world's population.

We are already 5 billion people over the natural carrying capacity of the planet. Don't you want to leave some of the earth's photosynthetic capacity to feed the rest of the animals that live here with us? For every human that lives, an animal in the wild must die and possibly go extinct.

So we really have to be frugal. And I mean frugal, especially in the future, because peak oil is here or nearly here. Why are you driving a one/two ton machine to the market to shop for food?

This is very inefficient. Walk instead. You say you cannot walk because it is too far.

Well, more bad news. The buildout of suburban American has been called by James Howard Kunstler as "the greatest misallocation of resources in the history of the world." It is entirely unsustainable.

It was predicated on cheap oil, which no longer exists. We are going to have to rebuild most of our cities to be more efficient, like the cities of Europe and Asia, where you can walk to the market. I don't know when we are going to do this, but maybe we need to start planning now.

And we need knowledgeable people in government who understand the physics behind this. We need informed economists and politicians that can implement policies that take into account natural law, for nature cannot be fooled. The policy of low interest rates that fueled the suburban buildout could have been avoided.

This was at least a two trillion dollar loss that could have been channeled into building sustainable cities. It took 100 years for us, the world, to consume half of the world's oil, so I guess (and this is an assumption mind you) it will take 100 years to before it is all gone. We then will have to get the population down to a level that the earth can carry sustainably, and that is near the 1 billion mark (or maybe 2).

So there will be a population die off. How many people is that per year? A lot.

I don't even want to calculate it. You can forget about air travel in the future.It will be a luxury for the few, as it was in the old days. You can forget about war, we are not going to be able to afford it.

We cannot afford it right now. Maybe we can fight it in the make-believe sense on video consoles. It is really a race against time, to get people informed, and for that, I thank the development of the internet, and the information sharing that it fosters at low energy cost.

This information transfer is happening via computers and especially the mobile phone. Already half of the world's population has mobile phones. You would be wise to not buy anything that is not necessary, except possibly as a store of wealth, and then use everything up.

Don't waste food. Half of the food in this country is thrown away. Wear out your clothes or at least wear your clothes longer, or alter them to fit in with the new fashion.

Don't run the hot water when you are washing the dishes, or brushing your teeth. Line dry your clothes if you live in the country. Stay healthy and take care of yourself, minimizing the consumption of expensive medical services.

Reduce your weight to a healthy level. Don't have children and add to the population problem. Take care of the family you have.

Learn how to communicate nonviolently. Learn how to share. Enjoy the free things in life.

Slow down and relax. Let love be your intention. Peace.

Duenhsiyen Duen Hsi Yen.

I'm sure this 100 dollar questions is gonna get about a 100 answers so I will try to keep this short but sweet. I am no expert in this subject but I think a few of these things need to be heard. 1.

What are some of the great challenges that relief workers and cleanup personal face in the gulf? The great challenges are fairly obvious, but they can get a little complicated once it comes down to the details. Obviously the biggest challenge for us right now is getting the thing to stop gushing oil.

Second is figuring out how to contain this oil and keep it from spreading out into the rest of the world. These are the surface problems that we are all aware of, and even problems that we can all help to solve. Especially when it comes to clean up efforts.

You might think your work is a drop in the water but complaining about it is even less of a drop in the same water. Still there is one problem that is much greater than the gushing and the cleaning combined. Really this problem was occurring before the oil spill, but the dangers of off-shore drilling never come up until we have an accident.

Even though it was happening before, the spill seems to have accelerated the problem. This disaster could possibly be the end of the world. If this theory turns out to be correct, there is nothing any scientist or machine will be able to do to stop it.

Here is my doomsday beliefs. Around 250 million years ago a methane bubble caused massive explosions, poisoned the atmosphere and destroyed more than 96 percent of all life on Earth. It is agreed amongst experts that this is what is known as the Permian extinction, this event was the greatest mass extinction in the history of the world.55 million years after this extinction another explosion of the same kind occurred, this led to more extinctions during the Late Paleocene Thermal Maximum (LPTM).

The methane blasts from under the sea during the LPTM era have helped to develop what we now call the Gulf of Mexico. Are you starting to follow what I am getting at? If not allow me to be much more direct.In my opinion soon the world will be subject to another mass extinction because of the amount of methane in the gulf.

Why you ask? Well, the initial oil rig dug very very deep into the crust of the earth, it is easy to see the concern that large amounts of methane could still be underneath the gulf of Mexico. Even though the relief wells are one of the only solutions, they will only further the possibility of the leaking methane problem.

If you still don't understand why this puts all humanity at grave danger, then allow me to quote an article: "The consequences of a methane-driven oceanic eruption for marine and terrestrial life are likely to be catastrophic. Figuratively speaking, the erupting region "boils over," ejecting a large amount of methane and other gases (e.g. , CO2, H2S) into the atmosphere, and flooding large areas of land. Whereas pure methane is lighter than air, methane loaded with water droplets is much heavier, and thus spreads over the land, mixing with air in the process (and losing water as rain).

The air-methane mixture is explosive at methane concentrations between 5% and 15%; as such mixtures form in different locations near the ground and are ignited by lightning, explosions and conflagrations destroy most of the terrestrial life, and also produce great amounts of smoke and of carbon dioxide..." and here is a video to make sure everyone is on the same page here. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KbnM1QpuwWI If this point is clear than I can move on. "Would pleading with the current US presidential administration to repeal The Jones Act help?

To allow skimmers and containment equipment in from up here in canada? How about donating equipment like cameras or volunteering if you live among the worst hit areas of this disaster? " As far as volunteering ideas I can't say it better than @edwardclint already did.

Check out dailygreen.Com or look at his answer on this thread. The ideas for cleaning and donating are a great help if you plan to get directly involved in a way that is economically and physically feasible to the Average Joe. The skimmers and containment would be a great help to keep the oil from getting into our rain and our in-land lakes.

I really can't see why they haven't already been using these resources. As far as volunteering, it is a must. Many people may think your not doing much but what you are doing to morally support yourself and others will be a great help.

Even if the undersea geyser pushes out 100x what you cleaned in a day you are still helping, weather you think so or not. I have to say the greatest solution to this and most any other question is knowledge. No one knows what the hell they are doing.

Simply understanding why the ocean is doing what it is, why did all this come about and what are the consequences? Everyone seems to have there own ideas, but no one is helping further them. Being aware of your values is a large part of knowledge in this case, our values are skewed and quite dumb if you ask me.Is having cheap gas worth permanently ruining natural resources and possibly our entire ecosystem?

How will this effect your opinion on off-shore drilling? Why did you support it before? And finally why do we have to have a natural disaster before anyone starts wondering these questions?

In short this is what you can do to help, BE AWARE. Learn, think, and convey your ideas to the world. Why would anyone else have ideas that are greater than yours?

Do they have experience with preventing a disaster of biblical proportions? No, and neither do you, so we are all qualified for this entry level URL5 may be a dead end job but its worth a shot. Man has triumphed over great disasters in the past when the odds were impossible, and we can do it again.

If we don't start trying to push back the apocalypse it will push right past us and we won't even have time to ask why. Maybe I am a step away from the homeless man on the street with the sign that says the end is near, but my quite serious theory is that this will be the end of the world. Call me crazy but it has to happen sometime, and what better time than now?

For the year 2010 I will be the virtual man on a virtual street holding the virtual sign...

I think the best thing everyone can do is to encourage innovation. I read a lot of reports on a magic pill for the oil spill, but I have not heard about any of them being used in a massive scale. While I am suspicious of such claims, I think everyone should be given a chance to invent and present technologies for the URL1 many people want to help in the cleanup, but if we don't have the right tools, nothing great will happen.

I have not heard a billionaire speak out against the oil spill. Bill Gates is giving most of his wealth to charity. Warren Buffett is giving away 99%.

I wonder why they have not directed a chunk of their charity money to the cleanup. Maybe they know better. One of the two thrusts of the Bill Gates Foundation is dedicated to bringing innovation to the field of education in the world.

Warren Buffett happens to be the number 1 supporter of the foundation outside the Gates family. I think the two wizards trust the world's populace to come up with something that can really do the cleanup. I have not heard Stephen Hawking say anything too.

Perhaps a good idea is to start a foundation that awards prizes to those that can invent the ultimate cleaner of earth, not just the Mexican Gulf and Atlantic Ocean. And the brightest of us should invent something. Hawking, Gates and Buffett cannot invent everything.

1) You can extend this question for 2 weeks and put it on the front page and make this a donation question, where all participants giving answers can start giving tips by voting interesting, all the money collected can be donated to the national wildlife federation....perhaps we can convince mahalo to match the donations collected or give the money in real dollars not mahalo dollars. This amazing new tool called crowd sourcing is an huge resource whereby small donations by many mahaloans can add up quickly....we did it for a few other causes....lets do it for the gulf. 2) we can help by physically going down to the coast and volunteering for one of the many organizations helping with the cleanup.3) we each need to make a promise for 2010 and beyond to use as little petroleum products as possible....BP or otherwise...yes any plastic is a petroleum product....gasoline is a petroleum product... here is a list of 144 items made from petroleum ranken-energy.com/Products%20from%20Petr... we can blame BP all day long but in the end we need to take responsibility for this spill....we demand so much oil from these companies that it's not surprising that things like this happen when they try to provide us with the huge amount that we demand.

Every time you buy a petroleum product you are voting for more drilling. If you don't think you are the problem...think again....every single american consumes petroleum products in some form or another equaling 3.5 gallons of oil every single day....that's 1277 gallons of oil a year that you are demanding form these companies which we all love to blame. This will not be the last oil spill if we keep consuming the way we do......as consumption keeps rising so will the frequency of man made natural disasters like this and the Exxon Valdez.

On the positive side if consumption goes down so will these disasters. 4) Don't think one person can make a difference....you are wrong....a recent study showed just how contagious behavior changes are, the people you surround yourselves with will begin to change even if you aren't preaching to them, this has been shown in all areas of human behavior....if you lose 20 pounds the chances of your friends losing 20 lbs go up over 50 percent and the chances of their friends being influenced is another 25%. This means you can influence people you don't even know just by changing your own actions.

Obviously the biggest problem is the sheer amount of cleanup that needs to be done. There are around 1-3 million barrels that have leaked into the Gulf, which is about 5-15% of the US daily oil consumption. Had this happened in the open ocean, it would be much easier to clean up, but with wetlands, beaches, and other rough terrain, it is much harder to clean up.

Government is also a big problem with the cleanup. Back when the spill started, the Louisiana proposed building sand berms off their coast to prevent the oil from reaching the shoreline, but the government failed to approve all of them before the oil made landfall. There are not many ways I can see that we can help other than helping the wildlife effected by this spill.

BP is already paying for all cleanup, so there is no way to really donate to a fund for the cleanup (other than wildlife rehabilitation), and they are also paying those that are losing money from this spill. They even created a fund to pay for those that have lost their jobs because of the deepwater drilling ban (which, although it has been overruled twice, companies are starting to move their rigs away from the US to other fields). As for repealing the Jones Act, I don't think that is a real viable option.

There are already thousands of vessels helping out with the cleanup, and you get to a point where you are basically maxed out. I am not sure how donating cameras would really help with dealing with this disaster. I am not sure what volunteering you can do, because BP is dealing with all of this, they aren't really allowing random people to come up and help out.

Also, that image you have of the oil spill is totally wrong The oil is yet to break out of the Gulf of Mexico, I have included some links to the most recent imagery of the spill.

The greatest challenge that the relief workers and personnel in the gulf face is the apathy of the general public. Anyone who hasn't been spending their time hiding under a rock large enough to obscure the view of the gushing oil on any given news channel during anytime night or day can probably tell how bad this disaster is, and a great deal of people have been complaining and exchanging ideas within a mild aura of confusion as to how exactly to deal with the problem. A lot of people have some really great ideas concerning how to deal with this environmental disaster.

What someone needs to do now is shut the hell up, get off their butt, and make an effort. bestchisale.com.

One of the most difficult aspects of the cleanup process in the Gulf of Mexico will be the handling of the salt water marshes. The techniques used for basic coastline cleanup will actually damage the super-sensitive wetlands. The Louisiana coast has over 7,700 miles of shallow estuaries, inlets, bays, reefs, and passes.

The primary danger is to the marsh plant life which essentially keep the soil intact. Once the plants die or actually suffocate from the oil exposure, the soil has nothing to hold it together and collapses. There is then no foundation for the plant life to grow back.

With the plant life gone, the bird and fish sanctuaries will be eliminated or greatly reduced. So, handling this delicate but expansive area is going to take a great effort and resources. One of the ways the average person can help is to volunteer, although it has been reported that because of the seriousness and complexity of the disaster often times volunteers must be trained and/or be professionals.

Also, many of the cleanup jobs are being given to contracted BP employees rather than volunteers. That shouldn't discourage the average person from making an attempt to volunteer. I would simply conduct a search for "Gulf of Mexico + volunteer" and there are hundreds of organizations coordinating volunteer efforts in Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi, and Florida.

Another way to help if you live in the area is to report oil damage. To report oiled wildlife you can call 1-866-557-1401. To report oil spill related damage you can call 1-800-440-0858.To report oiled shoreline you can call 1-866-448-5816.

If you want to make a financial contribution, you can use CharityNavigator. Com to find legitimate organizations that need financial assistance for oil spill related activities. Another indirect way to help is to purchase foods, products and services from the Gulf area states.

The increase in commerce can minimally effect the income and livelihood of residents that have been effected by the spill. ------------------ I think at this point continued political pressure is necessary, but the situation is in desperate need of a technical/scientific solution. We can repeal laws and create new regulations for future occurrences but that won't stop the oil from spewing.

We need a major effort from the scientific and engineering community to put a stop to the problem. Then we need a major cleanup effort to minimize long-term damage. Once the volcano stops erupting and people stop burning, we can start talking politics.

The greatest challenge that the relief workers and personnel in the gulf face is the apathy of the general public. Anyone who hasn't been spending their time hiding under a rock large enough to obscure the view of the gushing oil on any given news channel during anytime night or day can probably tell how bad this disaster is, and a great deal of people have been complaining and exchanging ideas within a mild aura of confusion as to how exactly to deal with the problem. A lot of people have some really great ideas concerning how to deal with this environmental disaster.

What someone needs to do now is shut the hell up, get off their butt, and make an effort.

I feel for those who are directly affected by this disaster esp. To the fishermen who have lost livelihood because of this and the businesses that depend on these poor fishermen. As reported, the containment and cleanup of the Gulf Coast have faced big challenges.

First, the huge amount of oil that is being released isn't that easy to be done and considering that this is harmful to the health as this can cause cardio-respiratory diseases and death, that makes it like the people are facing two crises at their worst. People have no better choice than to do what's needed to be done. Philippines also has experienced oil spill but that was described as minor compared to oil spills that happen abroad.

That also threatened the whole community surrounding the affected areas and the marine wildlife in the Visayas waters in that Guimaras oil spill. Thanks God that Mindanao waters wasn't affected by that oil spill but I still do feel for those who were affected. The Philippine government asked for the assistance of the countries like Japan, Indonesia and the US.So now, it's our turn to help also in this big crisis that has hit the Gulf Coast.

And one idea that comes to my mind is the same thing that was done also here in the Philippines. That we should donate our hair clippings be it our pets' or humans' in order to help in the clean up process. We all know by common sense that hairs can effectively collect dirts, dusts and oils so why not use them in the cleaning up of this oil spill?

And hay bales are also useful but I think these would need proper method in order not to make the problem worsen. These would be of big help to the cleaning up of oil spills. See this duck but I hope we don't need to put another lives of animals.

Just the hair clippings and anything we can donate can surely help.

I cant really gove you an answer,but what I can give you is a way to a solution, that is you have to find the anglde that you relate to or peaks your interest. A good paper is one that people get drawn into because it reaches them ln some way.As for me WW11 to me, I think of the holocaust and the effect it had on the survivors, their families and those who stood by and did nothing until it was too late.