PRESIDENT BARACK Obama has vowed to pursue those responsible for the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico as his attorney general, Eric Holder, travelled to Louisiana to meet federal and state prosecutors.
“We have an obligation to determine what went wrong,” Mr Obama said yesterday in the White House rose garden after meeting Senator Bob Graham of Florida and William Reilly, a former head of the Environmental Protection Agency. Mr Obama has appointed the men to co-chair a commission of inquiry into the oil spill.
“If laws were broken, leading to death and destruction, my solemn pledge is we will bring those responsible to justice,” Mr Obama said. The commission would determine the causes of the worst oil spill in US history, he said, and would ensure nothing like it ever happened again.
The Obama administration is now in the awkward position of considering criminal charges against British Petroleum, even as it relies on the company to stop the spill.
Six weeks after the Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded and sank, relations between the Obama administration and BP have deteriorated further since the disappointment of the failed “top kill” operation at the weekend.
"We've been increasingly frustrated with BP on matters of transparency," an administration official told the Washington Post.
In permit applications which it filed with the Minerals Management Service, BP claimed it was prepared for a spill 10 times the size of the Gulf of Mexico disaster.
Official estimates of the amount of oil gushing out of the well were more than doubled last week, amid reports that BP knew – but hid – the extent of the spill from the first week. More than 20 million gallons of crude have now been spilled into the Gulf of Mexico, compared to 11 million in the Exxon Valdezdisaster off Alaska in 1989.
The administration is so eager to distance itself from BP that it yesterday stopped holding joint press briefings with BP at the Unified Area Command headquarters in Robert, Louisiana. In an effort to convince the public that the government is in control of the disaster, coast guard admiral Thad Allen will hold daily briefings alone.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration predicted that winds from the southwest may push oil onto the barrier islands of Mississippi and Alabama today. The black sludge could reach popular tourist beaches in those states later this week.
BP has begun work on yet another scheme to staunch the spill. It will attempt to shear the twisted riser pipe from which the oil is escaping, cap it with a small, rubber-sealed dome and siphon oil to the surface.
An earlier similar operation failed because sea water and gas-formed ice crystals that clogged the hose intended to siphon the oil to the surface. BP says it will warm the outside of the new dome with heated water.
If these makeshift measures also fail, there is a real possibility that the leak will continue until two relief wells are completed in August.
By that time, more than 50 million gallons of oil may have been released into the Gulf.
A crimp in the riser pipe is believed to have braked the amount of oil escaping. Carol Browner, Mr Obama’s energy adviser, warned that the “cut and cap” manoeuvre could increase the volume of the spill by 20 per cent.
Adm Allen warned that the start of the hurricane season threatened to impede containment and clean-up efforts.
The season lasts until the end of November and the oceanic organisation has predicted it has an 85 per cent chance of being more severe than usual.