Page 6 - Rig Explosion News Today : Breaking News, Live Updates & Top Stories | Vimarsana

Peterson was aboard the first coast guard helicopter sent to the scene. and on the way, reports grew more dire by the minute. >> started progressing to a rig explosion, a rig on fire. 160 people in the water with injuries and it kept growing and growing and growing. >> reporter: as they circled the blazing deepwater horizon, it was immediately apparent, peterson says, they were flying into a full-blown catastrophe. with the chopper running low on fuel, the 39-year-old father of two was hoisted down on to the nearby supply ship that had now become, by necessity, a hospital. hundreds of people w...

And on the way, reports grew more dire by the minute. >> started progressing to a rig explosion, a rig on fire. 160 people in the water with injuries and it kept growing and growing and growing. >> reporter: as they circled the blazing deepwater horizon, it was immediately apparent, peterson says, they were flying into a full-blown catastrophe. with the chopper running low on fuel, the 39-year-old father of two was hoisted down on to the nearby supply ship that had now become, by necessity, a hospital. hundreds of people were treated out here that night, in the dark, in what became a makeshift...

Fire, because they had been disabled. >> i discovered it was inhibited about a year ago. i inquired as to why it was inhibited. the explanation i got was that from the lim down, they did not want people to wake up at 3:00 in the morning due to false alarms. later today, you will hear from the father of one of the 11 workers killed in the rig explosion. keith jones talks about cnn's fredricka whitfield at 3:00 eastern. right now, cleanup efforts are at a standstill in the gulf. the coast guard has left the area as well. how long are they going to have to be gone? they had to get out of the ...

Political plant but did a new campaign speech help democrat alvin greene gain new supporters in his bid to become south carolina's next u.s. senator? i'm wolf blitzer. you're in "the situation room." let's get back to our top story this hour. another 24 hours of testing now under way on the new well cap in the gulf of mexico. officials are keeping close watch on pressure readings and possible leaks but so far the incident commander thad allen says no significant problems have been detected. it's been four days since the cap shut in the well and stopped the oil that had been gushing since april...

They estimate up to 171 million gallons of crude have spilled into the ocean since the rig explosion. jonathan, how is the new cap going to work? >> reporter: the idea it provides a tighter fit. the problem is the current pipe going out of the well when they cut it, it wasn't a regular cut. it was a jagged cut. captain they had until today didn't felt it perfectly. on best, it was capturing half of the oil that was spilling out but the rest going out into the surrounding gulf. in theory, if this works, this new cap will be able to siphon off all the oil that is spilling out of the well carryin...