Page 5 - Control Burn News Today : Breaking News, Live Updates & Top Stories | Vimarsana

Oil spill in the gulf of mexico. if weather conditions hold up, the controlled burns of the thickest parts of the spill could begin shortly. oil from a damaged undersea well is gushing into the gulf, at the rate of about 42,000 gallons a day. right now, that massive slick is slowly drifting towards the gulf coast, threatening beaches and sensitive wetlands. joining us on the phone, coast guard commander richard schultz. commander schultz, when will the decision be made whether to set fire to this thing or not? >> we're actually working on that decision right now. we know that we have plans in ...

Will it work. >> reporter: we'll talk about that in a second but auto want to put it into perspective, how big it has become, the oil slick has grown to 100 miles wide and 45 miles long. the total circumference i'm told is 600 miles, roughly the same size as the country of jamaica. and this is really growing in terms of the size, plus is being pushed ashore and now is 20 miles or so, away from venice, louisiana, where we are and you mentioned the control burn, this is something they've done in the past, and it has proven to be successful. if it does work, it could eliminate roughly 50 to 95% o...

Latest updates on this topic from reliable sources.

Chris, show us what's going on behind threw. >> you bet, shepard. can you see crews are working hard to lower more of this boom on to this vessel to take it out to sea. this boom it's orange in color. you see it here. it's a floating barrier. they line the shoreline with this to protect the shore from that oil. i'm told roughly 100,000 feet of this boom already lines the coast from louisiana down to alabama and these guys are working extremely hard to get this boom out there before night fall, shep. >> shepard: they were originally starting to start this boom this morning but there were hang u...

Latest updates on this topic from reliable sources.