Boat captain working oil spill dead from gunshot wound / Oil gushing at spill site after vent damaged

12160 SOCIAL NETWORK - Resisting the New World Order

Join this network

blog.al.com

Boat captain working oil spill dead from gunshot wound, Coast Guard says

(www.rookiefishing.com)
A view of the website for Rookie Fishing Charters, which had a boat working in the Deepwater Horizon oil spill Vessels of Opportunity program. Boat captain William Allen Kruse was found dead from a gunshot wound aboard his boat on Wednesday, June 23, 2010.

A boat captain working in the oil spill response died from a gunshot wound this morning.

William Allen Kruse, born 1955, was the captain of The Rookie, a charter fishing boat normally based in Orange Beach, said Deputy Baldwin County Coroner Rod Steade .

Steade said the deckhands were on the docks and heard a gunshot and went back on and found him dead on the "flying bridge."

The boat was docked at the Gulf Shores Yacht Club & Marina at Fort Morgan, which is on the north side of Ala. 180 about 1.5 miles east of Fort Morgan.

The marina manager confirmed that the shooting had taken place there.

"I'm very sorry to announce the death this morning of a captain in the vessel of opportunity program at Fort Morgan, Alabama," said U.S. Coast Guard Commander Chuck Diorio, a spokesman for the joint information center at the Mobile command post. "Our hearts go out to his family and the Gulf Coast community. There are many facts that need to be determined surrounding this."

Diorio said the Gulf Shores Police Department was conducting an investigation.

msnbc
Oil gushing at spill site after vent damaged

Cap removed after sub hits vent; 2 cleanup workers die in separate events

NEW ORLEANS - Oil was again gushing from the BP spill site on Wednesday after the company was forced to remove the containment cap when a robotic submarine hit a vent. The news came as officials also reported two deaths of people who had been hired for the response effort.

BP hoped to reinstall the cap later Wednesday after fixing the vent and checking for safety.

When the robot bumped the system, gas rose through the vent that carries warm water down to prevent ice-like crystals from forming in the cap, Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen said.

The cap was removed and crews were checking to see if crystals had formed before putting it back on. Allen did not say how long that might take.

"There's more coming up than there had been, but it's not a totally unconstrained discharge," Allen said.

In the meantime, a different system was still burning oil on the surface.

Before the problem with the containment cap, it had collected about 700,000 gallons of oil in the previous 24 hours. Another 438,000 gallons was burned.

The current worst-case estimate of what's spewing into the Gulf is about 2.5 million gallons a day. Anywhere from 67 million to 127 million gallons have spilled since the April 20 explosion on the Deepwater Horizon rig that killed 11 workers and blew out a well 5,000 feet underwater. BP PLC was leasing the rig from owner Transocean Ltd.

Gunshot death reported
The deaths reported Wednesday were not tied to the containment operation. The Coast Guard said the workers had been involved in cleanup operations but that their deaths did not appear to be work related.

One death was a boat captain who died of a gunshot wound, a Coast Guard spokesman said. Further details were not immediately available.

Earlier Wednesday, BP said that Bob Dudley was appointed to head the new Gulf Coast Restoration Organization, which is in charge of cleaning up the oil spill.

BP said that the appointment was effective immediately.

Dudley, who had been in charge of BP's operations in the Americas and Asia, will report to Chief Executive Officer Tony Hayward.

"We were always going to set up the organization," he said on NBC's TODAY show. "But we have across the Gulf Coast people that are there temporarily, rotating in and out. We are going to bed this down now — we're in there for the long haul and we're going to make sure we're sustained and efficient in working with the Coast Guard to shut off the well and through the spill response and clean up."

He also was asked if BP would start deepwater drilling again in the Gulf after a judge lifted a White House moratorium.

He replied that BP will "step back" from the issue while the April 20 rig explosion is investigated. "That process is going to take awhile," he added.

BP is the largest oil and gas producer in the Gulf.

New drilling ban order
On Tuesday, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said he will issue a new order imposing a moratorium on deepwater drilling after a federal judge struck down the existing one.

Salazar said in a statement that the new order will contain additional information making clear why the six-month drilling pause was necessary in the wake of the Gulf oil spill. The judge in New Orleans who struck down the moratorium earlier in the day complained there wasn't enough justification for it.

Salazar pointed to indications of inadequate industry safety precautions on deepwater wells. "Based on this ever-growing evidence, I will issue a new order in the coming days that eliminates any doubt that a moratorium is needed, appropriate, and within our authorities."

The White House, which had hoped the ban would provide time to ensure other wells are operating safely, immediately said it would appeal.

The judge's ruling comes in a lawsuit filed by drilling companies to reverse the ban imposed by the Department of Interior, which halted the approval of any new permits for deepwater drilling and suspended drilling at 33 exploratory wells in the Gulf.

The federal judge in Louisiana granted the drillers' request for a preliminary restraining order that would prevent the ban from taking effect until a trial is held. He did not set a trial date.

District Judge Martin Feldman said the Interior Department failed to provide adequate reasoning and that the moratorium seems to assume that because one rig failed, all companies and rigs doing deepwater drilling pose an imminent danger.

White House press secretary Robert Gibbs countered that "continuing to drill at these depths without knowing what happened does not make any sense and ... potentially puts the safety of those on the rigs and the safety of the environment in the Gulf at a danger that the president does not believe we can afford right now."

Salazar said in his late Tuesday statement imposing a moratorium "was and is the right decision."

"We see clear evidence every day, as oil spills from BP's well, of the need for a pause on deepwater drilling," Salazar said. "That evidence mounts as BP continues to be unable to stop its blowout, notwithstanding the huge efforts and help from the federal scientific team and most major oil companies operating in the Gulf of Mexico."

Favorite

0 members favorited this

Comment

You need to be a member of 12160 Social Network to add comments!

Join 12160 Social Network

Comment by fireguy on June 24, 2010 at 4:13pm: So the rogue robot sub crashed and took off the cap? The driver of that thing should cap him/herself, moron.

Comment by truth on June 23, 2010 at 5:55pm: HMMM..... Gulf oil spill: Boat captain, despondent over spill, commits suicide
June 23, 2010 | 11:51 am

William Allen Kruse, 55, a charter boat captain recently hired by BP as a vessel of opportunity out of Gulf Shores, Ala., died Wednesday morning before 7:30 a.m. of a gunshot to the head, likely self-inflicted, authorities said.

"He had been quite despondent about the oil crisis," said Stan Vinson, coroner for Baldwin County, which includes Gulf Shores.

Kruse, who lived with his family in nearby Foley, Ala., reported to work Wednesday morning as usual at the Gulf Shores Marina on Fort Morgan Road in Gulf Shores, Vinson said. He met up with his two deckhands at his boat, The Rookie. One of the deckhands later told Vinson that Kruse seemed his usual self, sending them to fetch ice while he pulled the boat around to the gas pumps.

As the deckhands walked off to get ice, they heard what sounded like a firecracker, Vinson said. They turned around but didn't see anything out of the ordinary. So they proceeded to gather the ice and wait for Kruse at the pumps. "He never showed," Vinson said.

After waiting a while, the deckhands returned to the boat, which was moored where they had left it, Vinson said. They went aboard and found Kruse at the captain's bridge above the wheelhouse, Vinson said. He had been shot in the head. A Glock handgun was later recovered from the scene, and investigators do not suspect foul play, Vinson said.

Vinson said Kruse was in good health, did not suffer from any mental illness and was not taking psychotropic medications.

But he said it's not surprising the oil spill had weighed heavily on his mind, as it has on many local fishermen no longer able to support themselves with deep-sea sport fishing trips for marlin and the like, Vinson said.

"All the waters are closed. There's no charter business anymore. You go out on some of the beaches now, with the oil, you can't even get in the water," Vinson said. "It's really crippled the tourism and fishing industry here."

Vinson's office was to perform an autopsy Wednesday, and the Gulf Shores Police Department is still investigating. Det. Justin Clopton did not return calls.

Kruse's family was notified by Wednesday afternoon, Vinson said, and his deckhands were sent home for the day.
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/greenspace/2010/06/gulf-oil-spill-b...
-- Molly Hennessy-Fiske