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Oil slick expected to reach Louisiana ports Friday
By: cnn.comPosted On: 04/30/2010 11:42 A
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Officials anticipate Venice and Port Fourchon, Louisiana, will be the first places affected Friday when the massive oil spill caused by a rig explosion reaches shore, said a spokesman for the oil company BP.
Officials anticipate Venice and Port Fourchon, Louisiana, will be the first places affected Friday when the massive oil spill caused by a rig explosion reaches shore, said a spokesman for the oil company BP.
Officials monitoring the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico have not yet confirmed reports that oil reached land early Friday.
The Coast Guard was conducting a flyover Friday morning to see if oil had reached Louisiana's coastline as federal, state and local officials scrambled to avert a natural disaster threatening to surpass the Exxon Valdez disaster 20 years ago in Alaska.
Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal has asked the Defense Department to approve funding for the deployment of 6,000 National Guard troops to the state.
Jindal wants at least 90 days of military duty for soldiers and airmen to respond to the oil spill threat, the governor's office said.
Jindal declared a state of emergency Thursday, warning that the oil spill covered as much as 600 square miles of water.
People along the Louisiana coast caught a whiff of the wafting smell of oil, fearing an environmental nightmare of greater scope than when the Valdez tanker ran aground in Alaska's Prince William Sound in 1989 and spilled 11 million gallons of oil.
"There's certainly immense potential consequences," said LuAnn White, director of the Tulane Center for Applied Environmental Public Health.
"This is a disaster," said Dean Blanchard, who runs a wholesale seafood business in the region. "We definitely need some help."
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