MetaChat - This thread is for ideas for stopping the Gulf oil spill.

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11 May 2010

This thread is for ideas for stopping the Gulf oil spill. →[More:]Listening to the news this morning, I felt like I was listening to crazy schemes from cartoon sci-fi or something, as if the Speed Racer crew were engineering the cleanup. "First, we tried lowering a GIANT DOME over the oil spill. Then it was GIANT FUNNEL. Today we're blasting the tube full of GOLF BALLS AND SHREDDED TIRES. Tonight we're going to try FITTING IT WITH A DIAPHRAGM-LIKE 'TOP HAT'."

Hell, we're no engineers, but hey, we can come up with nutty space-age ideas for stopping the leak (actually a gusher).

Here are some of mine:

- Stuff WORLD'S LARGEST POTATO into tube
- Cover tube with thousands of balls of SILLY PUTTY
- Use mile-high CRAZY STRAW to reroute gushing oil into an onshore tank
-Sprinkle iron filings into oil and pick it all up with an ENORMOUS MAGNET

post by: Miko at: 16:57 | 14 comments

- Stick 10 pounds of dynamite 100 yards down the well, blow it up, and let the collective rubble plug it.
- Carve an appeal in a giant rock mountain for the Enterprise to travel back to our time, and let Scotty deal with it.

posted by Ardiril 11 May | 17:32

- cover it with tons of sand (hey, it works on land, right?)
- pour cement over the hole (they did that with the MS Estonia)
- CALL SUPERMAN!
- Stuff a giant pink bunny in the hole.

posted by dabitch 11 May | 17:37

Light fire under oil.
Throw raw KFC extra-crispy chicken.
Extract chicken.
Eat chicken.

By my calculations, it should take about two dozen chicken pieces to absorb 10 million gallons of oil.

posted by qvantamon 11 May | 18:44

Throw a few BP executives in the hole.

posted by govtdrone 11 May | 19:41

Sponges, lots 'n' lots of sponges!

posted by deborah 11 May | 19:44

They did a poll like this on NPR. One listener suggested human hair. One caller suggested pouring down concrete in an inner pipe as dabitch has mentioned. The expert did comment on the concrete idea and I cannot remember what he said about it.

posted by LoriFLA 11 May | 20:07

Oh, and there's a method that has been proven to never fail.

Put a "FREE OIL" announcement on Craigslist.

posted by qvantamon 11 May | 20:19

I say we take off and nuke the entire site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure.

posted by Hugh Janus 11 May | 20:50

Have we run out of duct tape already?

posted by hangashore 11 May | 21:04

Throw money at the problem.

posted by mullacc 11 May | 21:29

They did a poll like this on NPR.

Wow. It makes me feel a little nervous that we're even looking to the general public for ideas...

Duct tape! That's it! Like the say, if you can't duct it, fuck it.

posted by Miko 11 May | 21:45

Hugh Janus: They're already on that.

posted by TheophileEscargot 12 May | 01:12

NYT op -ed had the best: soak it up with hair and then use it for fuel...with the best filters, of course.

posted by brujita 12 May | 02:14

Big Gap Filler

posted by toastedbeagle 13 May | 08:24

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