4 MORE VICTIMS CLAIMED BY THE DEADLY U.S. ROADS: FIERY, HEAD-ON HIGH-SPEED CRASH CLAIMS TN FAMILY OF 3 AND THE LIFE OF THE SPEEDING MOTORIST

MAY 18, 2015

BOONE, NC (AP)

The North Carolina Highway Patrol says a Tennessee family of three and a South Carolina motorist are dead after a high-speed crash in the North Carolina mountains.

Highway Patrol Trooper Matthew Grogan said Sunday that the driver of a five-ton pickup truck was traveling at least 90 miles an hour around a slight curve when he slammed head-on into the Tennessee family's Honda Civic.  Both vehicles burst into flames after the Saturday night crash.

Dead are 24-year-old Nicholas Blackwell, his 23-year-old wife Molly and their 11-month-old daughter Harper, all of Mountain City, Tennessee.

Grogan says 64-year-old Michael Pinkham of Ridgeway, South Carolina, was pulled from his burning truck by passers-by. He died later at a hospital in nearby Boone.

The accident happened on U.S. Highway 421 on the Tennessee-North Carolina border.

Along with Greece, Serbia also Wants to Join Turkish Stream

Published in Oil Industry News on Monday, 18 May 2015

Serbia is interested in joining the Turkish Stream gas pipeline project, as it wants to ensure energy security for its citizens and cut dependence on deliveries via Ukraine, said the Serbian Minister of Foreign Affairs Ivica Dacic.

"At present, we can express our readiness for participation in this project because we need reliable gas supplies," Dacic said at a news conference in Belgrade after talks with Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov on Friday.

Serbia is concerned that everything can be done with regard to the Nord Stream gas pipeline that runs under the Baltic Sea to supply Russia gas directly to Germany and North Europe bypassing transit states, but everything is forbidden with regard to the gas project from the south, although they transit the same gas from Russia, Dacic added. He called for the European Union to support the Turkish Stream project from the very beginning "grasp the essence of the problem from the very start."

In December 2014 Russia suspended the South Stream project as the EU was blocking its implementation. Instead, Gazprom and Turkey’s Botas Petroleum Pipeline Corporation signed a memorandum to construct the Turkish Stream pipeline through the Black Sea with the same capacity of 63 billion cubic meters. 

Turkish Stream will pump gas to a hub on the Turkish-Greek border.

The EU could influence Bulgaria, which repeatedly spoke out against the implementation of South Stream, but not Serbia, said Dacic. He explained his rather emotional assessment of the EU role in the cancellation of the South Stream as he saw a threat to Russian gas supplies through Ukraine next winter. 

He added that Serbian authorities are obliged to ensure security of supply for its citizens.

"We wouldn’t like to find ourselves in a situation, in several years, when we’ll have to look for those who are to blame for the fact that winter has come and there are no more gas supplies via Ukraine," he said recalling that Ukraine is the only country through which Serbia receives Russian gas.

Turkish Stream will allow the strengthening of EU energy security, said Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov on Friday following talks with Dacic.

Turkish Stream will be 1,100 kilometers long and include four pipes. The first one will replace transit from Ukraine to western Turkey. The other three will replace Ukrainian transit to Central and Southern Europe.

In April, Aleksandr Medvedev the Deputy Chairman of Gazprom said that the fourth pipe of Turkish Stream will be finished by 2020.
Source: rt.com

Fools Never Learn: Private American Oil Company to Drill Near Deepwater Horizon, in Attempt to Re-Create The 2010 Oil Spill Disaster

Published in Oil Industry News on Monday, 18 May 2015
A privately owned US oil company, LLOG Exploration Offshore has been given permission to drill near BP’s Deepwater Horizon, the place of largest oil spill in US history.

Approval to drill into the Macondo reservoir, close to Deepwater Horizon, was given to the Louisiana-based firm LLOG by the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement on April 13, and the information became public earlier this week.

Experts are split on whether the firm will be able to avoid a repetition of the 2010 disaster.

“BP had deep pockets. You don’t want someone not particularly qualified and not fully amortized to be tangling with this particular dragon,” said Richard Charter, a senior fellow with the Ocean Foundation and a longtime industry watchdog. He also said that when a company can’t pay when something goes wrong, generally it’s the public that pays.

Eric Smith, associate director of the Tulane University Energy Institute in New Orleans, dismissed Charter’s concern.

He called LLOG an extremely well-financed and well-organized company with an excellent reputation and well-known veteran staff.

LLOG staff have shown a commitment to preventing a similar event occurring. LLOG’s website claims the company has a 93 percent development success rate and a 70 percent exploration success rate while the budget is unrevealed.

On 20 April 2010 an explosion and fire on the BP-licensed Transocean drilling rig Deepwater Horizon killed 11 workers, and seriously injured 17 more. About 4.1 million barrels of oil spewed into the gulf. A was later determined a device intended to prevent the release of crude oil failed to activate, which was the main reason for the accident.
Source: rt.com

TEXAS OILMEN GOT MAD: NEW TEXAS GOP-SPONSORED LAW BANS CITIES FROM BANNING FRACKING, DRILLING

MAY 18, 2015

AUSTIN, TEXAS (AP)

Messy Texas.  If the high pollution, high road death rates, high property insurance rates, high homicides, biker gangs, tornados, hail and floods are not enough, now the new moron in the governor’s office signed into “law” a piece of crappy paper that declares that locals cannot ban fracking and other nuisances from their communities.   

These are the same individuals who let the motherfrackers do what they want without much regulation and now many of them are bankrupt, bust and gone.  This insanity must stop, but in deaf Texan’s door you can knock as many times as you want, as the old saying goes.

Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has signed into law a prohibition on cities and towns imposing local ordinances preventing fracking and other potentially environmentally harmful oil and natural gas activities.

The much-watched measure sailed through the GOP-controlled Legislature after voters in Denton, a university town near Dallas, banned hydraulic fracturing locally in November.

The new law limits not only the Denton ban but other actions communities could take limiting energy industry activities. It was backed by oil and gas concerns.

Abbott said Monday he was protecting private property rights from the "heavy hand of local regulation."

He saw no contradiction in new state regulations superseding local voters' will, saying he believes "individuals have a much better idea how to run their own lives than do a bunch of government officials."

MORE THAN 100,000 GALLONS OF RAW SEWAGE SPILLED AT LOVERS POINT IN PACIFIC GROVE MONDAY. SEWAGE FLOWED INTO THE OCEAN FOR SIX HOURS.

MAY 18, 2015

PACIFIC GROVE, CALIFORNIA

More than 100,000 gallons of raw sewage spilled at Lovers Point in Pacific Grove Monday and sewage flowed into the ocean for six hours.

Monterey Regional Water Pollution Control Agency workers were doing maintenance repairs at a pump station on Ocean View Boulevard at Lovers Point when a plug valve failed at 10:30 a.m., Monterey Deputy Fire Marshal David Reade said. 

This caused the station to flood and fill with sewage. Power was quickly shutoff to prevent an electrocution hazard, Reade said, but crews failed to stop 100,000 gallons of raw sewage from discharging into the Monterey Bay.

Reverse emergency calls were made to residents in the area urging against flushing toilets and using water.

Crews fixed the valve at 5:30 p.m. They had hoped to fix it before residents returned home from work, when water use spikes.

Scott Kathey, emergency response coordinator for the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary, said cleaning sewage out of the ocean is impossible.

"From an environmental standpoint, there is nothing we can do mechanically to recover it from the ocean. There is no method for cleaning other than let the ocean assimilate it, allow sunlight to breakdown bacteria," Kathey said. 

"On land you can treat it with bleach and vacuum it up. You can't do that in an aquatic environment," he said.

When asked what environmental impact may occur, Kathey said, "It's hard to say. Obviously the plume is going to spread. Any kind of effects would be long-term."

Marine animals could develop bacterial infections from coming into contact with the sewage, he said. Luckily, there were no sea otters or seals nearby at the time of the spill.

The recreational trail was closed to the public from the Monterey Bay Aquarium to Point Pinos. Lovers Point Beach was also closed, as well as all beaches one mile to the north and one mile to the south of it. 

FLARE TORCH SPARKS BOAT BLAZE IN ALTAMONTE SPRINGS, FLORIDA

MAY 15, 2015

ALTAMONTE SPRINGS, FLORIDA

A boater fired a flare gun in the wrong direction on Lake Orienta on Friday morning, sparking a blaze that destroyed his boat, according to firefighters.

According to the Seminole County Fire Department, the man was having motor issues and fired the gun before 5:30 a.m.

The 17-foot boat went up in flames, but the man was able jump into the water wearing a life jacket and flag down rescuers.

“His boat motor stalled, and in order to signal someone for help, he tried to use a flare gun, but instead of the flare going up in the air, it went down into the boat and that's what started the fire,” said Seminole County Fire Lt. Dave Williams.

The boater was not injured.

Firefighters worked with a towing company to remove the boat from the water by 7:30 a.m.

“Our big concern is the fuel and the oil that still remains in there. We’re trying to secure everything to make sure there is no more environmental hazards,” said Williams.

Williams said they were using absorbent material to soak up the oil and fuel, which was estimated between two and five gallons.

“Even that small amount could affect the local plant life, the aquatic life, the fish and even the birds,” he said.

The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission was called to the scene.