VENICE, La/PENSACOLA BEACH, Fla – The latest effort to siphon oil and gas gushing from a ruptured deep-sea wellhead in the Gulf of Mexico is working well so far, U.S. officials said on Saturday, as President Barack Obama defended his handling of the environmental crisis.
British energy giant BP Plc said it collected 6,077 barrels (255,000 gallons/966,000 liters) of oil per day from the well on Friday, and that "improvement in oil collection is expected over the next several days."
After soiling wetland wildlife refuges in Louisiana and barrier islands in Mississippi and Alabama, the black tide of pollution has reached some of the famous white beaches of Florida.
The toll of dead and injured birds and marine animals, including sea turtles and dolphins, is also climbing.
But 47 days into the crisis and after several unsuccessful attempts at containment by BP, a partial solution finally appears at hand.
The containment cap that BP clamped over the leak earlier this week was siphoning oil to a waiting drill-ship at a faster rate than initially estimated, U.S. Coast Guard Admiral Thad Allen said at a briefing in Theodore, Alabama.
Bob Fryar, senior vice president with BP, later told a meeting of local mayors in Alabama that the latest undersea containment effort had gone "extremely well" so far.
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