80 Days into the Oil Spill that took place down in the Gulf of Mexico, which started on April 20th, 2010 (Earth Day), we defiantly have something to learn about the way we should handle disasters (whether natural or manmade). This oil spill has been blamed on so many people, and nobody knows what to think or who to point a finger at. It seems we are too overwhelmed about who caused it rather than fixing the problem. I want to fill in a few things that I think we can learn from this in the case that a similar disaster should happen in the future.

First of all, right after the event occurred, people are curious about how it happened, and not about how to fix it quickly. At first, blame was shifted to BP, then shifted to Transocean (owner of the rig), then to the company that made it in South Korea. And still, 80 days into the disaster, we are still more concerned about deciding who’s fault it is. As the saying goes: “Don’t cry over spilled milk.” This seems very logical to me right now. I’m not trying to play down the event at all, it’s that we should focus our effort and support for finding a solution rather than a scapegoat.

Secondly, we need better leadership to coordinate this. It started off with BP being in charge of the cleanup, which is not only a horrible idea, but a conflict of interest. Then stepped up Robert Gibbs, the White House Press Secretary. He said that the spill was under White House authority since the disaster. Then Obama says that the White House is closely monitoring BP in their improvement efforts. What this tells me is that even the White House has little to no control over this. After being offered a major skimmer from Europe to help, the White House immediately declared that due to (outdated) maritime laws, that they were not allowed to come into the Gulf and aid the recovery.

Thirdly, it’s aggravating to hear people saying that this is a reason to stop oceanic oil drilling. Out of thousands of rigs that are located around the world, a very very small percentage have ever spilled a drop of oil. The analogy that has been used is with airplanes. Airplanes crash from time to time (whether accidents, weather, or humans), we simply cannot rule out aerial transportation because of its low cost and time effectiveness. Same goes for Oil Drilling. It is obviously the cheapest, and most accessible energy source, and most required by our means of transportation. Instead, lets impose regulation to make Oil Drilling safer, not try to ban it altogether.

There was many things the White House did wrong with the management of this disaster. Here is the way I would have done it.

  1. Release a Press Conference (as quickly as possible) notifying America of my plans
  2. Invite all other experts in the industry (not just professors and scientists) to get together as soon as possible (under 3 days) and assess the damage, and decide several plans to fix it.
  3. Investigate the source of the problem, and hold them financially liable for the cleanup plans (as planned above)
  4. Appoint several professionals in the field, and have them make sure the plans get done
  5. Once the cleanup is contained, then work on drafting legislation to impose safety requirements
  6. When effort is 97% completed, give a press conference to notify the American people of the strengths and weaknesses of the efforts, and reflecting what has been done to make sure it doesn’t happen again.

The basic moral of my ideas is not to cry over spilled milk, but instead, make sure the milk is cleaned up, then make sure the milk doesn’t spill again.