Cap back on leaking Gulf oil well

NEW ORLEANS -- Earlier this month, BP predicted the oil gushing from the bottom of the sea would be reduced to a "relative trickle" within days, and President Barack Obama told the nation last week that as much as 90 percent would soon be captured. But those goals seemed optimistic Thursday after another setback a mile underwater this week.

A deep-sea robot bumped into the cap collecting oil from the well, forcing a temporary halt Wednesday to the company's best effort yet to contain the leak. The cap was back in place Thursday, but frustration and skepticism were running high along the Gulf Coast.

BP's pronouncements have "absolutely no credibility," Jefferson Parish Councilman John Young said. The latest problem shows "they really are not up to the task and we have more bad news than we have good news."

Even before the latest setback, the government's worst-case estimates suggested the cap and other equipment were capturing less than half of the oil leaking from the sea floor. And in recent days, the "spillcam" video continued to show gas and oil billowing from the blown-out well.

BP spokesman John Curry laid out in new detail the company's plans to have additional ships in place that can capture even more oil, and said he understands the frustration.

"We want to do what everybody wants and that's of course to minimize the impact as quickly and efficiently as possible and without injury to any of the workers," he said.

In other developments:

* The spill began arriving in sheets of oil on the Florida coast, forcing the first closing of a beach in the state since the accident more than nine weeks ago, and fouled some of Mississippi's most fertile coastal waters.

* The federal judge who struck down the Obama administration's six-month ban on deep-water drilling in the Gulf refused to stay his ruling while the government appeals.

* Environmental groups asked the court to release additional information about U.S. District Judge Martin Feldman's holdings in oil-related stocks.

At nearly every important juncture since the Deepwater Horizon rig exploded April 20, killing 11 workers, the government's and BP's estimates on the size of the spill, its effect on wildlife and the time frame for containing it have spectacularly missed the mark.

On June 8, BP chief operating office Doug Suttles said the spill should be reduced to a "relative trickle" in less than a week. BP later said it would take more time for the spill to reach a trickle.

Obama used the 90 percent figure last week in his first address from the Oval Office and after meeting with BP officials at the White House, saying the company had informed him that was how much of the oil could be kept out of the water within weeks.

"It just doesn't look like that's in the cards," said Ed Overton, a retired professor of environmental science at Louisiana State University. "We're not even close to that, and the word today is that they were capturing less than the day before."

BP said Thursday it was gradually ramping back up to capture about 700,000 gallons a day with the cap, and burning off an additional 438,000 a day using an incinerator ship.

Worst-case government estimates are that about 2.5 million gallons are leaking from the well, though no one really knows for sure.

By mid- to late July, the company hopes to have the capacity to capture up to 3.3 million gallons a day, if that much is flowing, Curry said.

It cannot all be done immediately, Curry said, because the logistics of positioning four giant ships capable of collecting oil and connecting them to the seafloor are complicated. "There's a limit to the number of ships in the world that do these type of things," he said.

None of those efforts is expected to stop the leak entirely. The soonest that would happen is August, which is when BP says relief wells being drilled through thousands of feet of rock beneath the seabed will reach the gusher.

That seemed a long way off to many.

In Florida, officials closed a quarter-mile stretch of Pensacola Beach not far from the Alabama line when thick pools of oil washed up, the first time a beach in the state has been closed because of the spill.

Lifeguard Collin Cobia wore a red handkerchief over his nose and mouth to block the oil smell. "It's enough to knock you down," he said.

In Mississippi, which has so far been largely spared from the spill, a large patch of oil oozed into Mississippi Sound, the fertile waters between the state's barrier islands and its mainland.

BP has its supporters, or at least those still giving it the benefit of the doubt.

"I think BP has done more than any oil company has ever done for this kind of spill," said Stephen "Scooter" Resweber, a 62-year-old councilman in Grand Isle, La. "If they are saying 90 percent, they must be pretty confident. That's putting your money where your mouth is."

Others weren't happy about the situation but declined to second-guess the BP engineers.

"I have no clue at all about the correct way to stop it," said Rocky Ditcharo, a seafood dock owner in Louisiana's Plaquemines Parish. "`Powerless' -- that's a good word for it."