and black hawks dropping in and filling in the eight passes on pelican island, we re working the three largest passes in schofield island, filling the gaps. the idea is let s fight the oil outside the barrier islands. don t let the oil get inside. we passed it on the way out here, we don t want them getting to the wetlands and killing off the oysters. reporter: isn t it a drop in the bucket compared to berms and everything else? this is one of several tactics. this will complement the hesco baskets. we ve done over seven miles in plaquemines parish and seven ilmiles in jefferson parish. and the national guard has instructed them to do. we ll use anything and everything we ve got. this did a war. we ve got to be adaptable with our tactics what we re doing if we can fill in are we ve identified 40 miles along our coast. this won t replace sand dredging but complement it. when the oil pools here, we ve gotten permission to deploy the barges, the suction barges, the vacuumage barge vac
i think it probably given everything that s happened it makes some sense. i think if i were him i would be very aloof. it would be perhaps a criminal corporation, and i would treat them that way. i wouldn t i would let them know who is in charge. i would demand answers to any number of questions from the access of our journalists to the constant underestimating what this is. and i would i would if i was him, i d be decidedly aloof and cool, if you will. what about your strategy advice for the president, ed? james and i seldom disagree, and obviously this is his turf. but i would be very, very serious. they talk about the president dropping by this meeting. this is not a drop-by meeting. i would make it very clear that what they ve done to this point is totally unacceptable and it
we get about 85 million tourists come to the sunshine state every year. i think in large measure because florida is such a beautiful place to visit and a great place to come. but we re doing everything we can to try to protect her. and we ll keep doing that every day. how far has the oil spread to the beaches of florida at least right now? not that far. and that s the good news. at least in the short-term. now, we don t know what the long-term effect is going to be, nobody does. and that really is all contingent on capping that spew that s coming out of the middle of the gulf of mexico. we re glad that they ve got a cap on top of it that is siphoning off some of that flow. but really, the long-term solution is to plug the hole. and get that thing done and bp needs to be responsible and do that. have you had to close any beaches in florida yet? wolf, we haven t yet, no. i was talking with governor riley of alabama today, they ve had minimal closures. it was beautiful, it was pri
shoreline, there won t be enough booms or skimmers. we got tired of waiting and we were being told that more booms and skimmers were coming. but we said we can t wait for others, we ve got to go out and protect our coast. reporter: after i spoke to the governor, i had a chance to go out myself to go on one of the gaps being filled to go on top of the sandbags and get a sense of how well they work. it s working fairly well. it s not fail-safe, it doesn t prevent everything from going through, but it does it is fairly effective in stemming most of the tide. and speaking of the tide, that in and of itself is another key factor. the tides often shift around the barrier islands and the gaps will not be fail-safe, but you really got a sense of how ambitious and massive this job is. they ve got 40 of these gaps to fill just within these barrier islands, wolf. wow, brian todd, he s doing excellent reporting for us from the scene. thank you. how much oil is really spewing into the gulf