Deano Bonano, the emergency preparedness director for Jefferson Parish, marched from a motor home being used as a command center to an office across the street filled with BP officials.
“I think they’re adequate to the assumptions in the plans. I think you need to go back and question the assumptions.” ADM. THAD W. ALLEN, national commander for the spill, referring to response efforts
It was late May. Oil had been creeping into the passes around Grand Isle. Two fleets of fishing boats were supposed to be laying out boom, the long floating barriers to corral oil and protect the fragile marshes of Barataria Bay.
But the boats were gathered on the inland side of the bay — the wrong side — anchored idly as the oil oozed in from the Gulf of Mexico. BP officials said they had no way of contacting the workers on the boats, Mr. Bonano recalled.
“You’re watching the oil come in,” Mr. Bonano said, “and they can’t even move.”
Full Story: Onshore Oil Spill Response Is Described as Chaotic – NYTimes.com