"Manslaughter," reads the United States Code, "is the unlawful killing of a human being without malice." It goes on, "Whoever is guilty of involuntary manslaughter, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than six years, or both." In the disasters at the Massey coal mine in West Virginia and on the BP oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico, people were killed. Twenty-nine miners died in the Upper Big Branch mine explosion. Eleven workers died on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig, which is owned by Transocean, working under contract for BP. There are state laws that govern manslaughter as well, and special language given for maritime deaths. So why aren't the executives of these companies behind bars? Yes, these two disasters bring into sharp focus the need to reduce our national addiction to fossil fuels. The gulf oil eruption (for that is what it is, not a "spill" and not merely a "leak," but the unleashing of a hugely powerful jet of oil and gas under enormous pressure, a mile beneath the ocean surface) is likely to become the worst environmental disaster in United States history.
Mike Williams, the chief electronics technician of the Transocean oil rig, detailed on "60 Minutes" the negligence of both Transocean and BP in the lead-up to the blowout. Williams said a mistake was made during a pressure test, which damaged a critical safety gasket, or annular. Later, a crew member reported finding chunks of the rubber gasket in the effluent that surfaces during the drilling process. This annular is part of the blowout preventer, which is the device on the ocean floor, atop the well, that is supposed to serve as the fail-safe, to prevent exactly the type of catastrophe that is unfolding now. There also was a known electrical failure on the blowout preventer.
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