Well, gosh. BP failed again.
With "top kill" failed and out of the picture, BP is trying something called "top cap." Basically they had to make a clean cut across the crumpled pipe in order to fit a "cap" securely over the leak. Unfortunately, the saw jammed during the cut, leaving the edges jagged. Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen said this could leave the "top cap" less effective because the seal may not fit over the pipe smoothly.
BP is still working on drilling relief wells, which should be completed sometime between August and December, but until then it looks like the oil will continue to flow.
"More than 100 miles of marshland and beaches are already tarred, and a fishing area the size of Florida is closed in the Gulf...The total amount of oil that has spewed from the well is now into the tens of millions of gallons, perhaps twice the amount that leaked when the Exxon Valdez hit ground in Prince William Sound in 1989. It's by most accounts the worst environmental disaster in US history."
Full article here (The Christian Science Monitor)
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