Live Video Shows Gushing Underwater Oil Leak
A live video feed that shows the oil gushing from the blown-out well in the Gulf of Mexico is now available online.
The video shows a large plume of oil and gas still spewing next to the tube that's carrying some of it to the surface.
Special Section: Disaster in the Gulf
Congressman Ed Markey of Massachusetts pushed BP PLC to make the video available to the public. It's now posted on the Web site of the Select Committee on Energy Independent and Global Warming.
BP was leasing the rig Deepwater Horizon when it exploded and sank a month ago off Louisiana. The company has been trying ever since to stop the oil spewing from the well.
BP says a mile-long tube is capturing 210,000 gallons of oil a day, but some is still escaping. The company initially estimated 210,000 gallons was the total amount of the spill.
Independent scientists began forming their own estimates after BP succumbed to pressure to release the video footage. Steve Wereley, a mechanical engineer at Purdue University in Indiana, told The Associated Press that he is sticking with his estimate that 3.9 million gallons a day is spewing from two leaks.
"I don't see any scenario where (BP's) numbers would be accurate," he said at a congressional hearing Wednesday.
His estimate of the amount leaked to date, which he calls conservative and says has a margin of error of plus or minus 20 percent, is 126 million gallons - or more than 11 times the total leaked from the Exxon Valdez disaster in 1989.