"Unrealized at the time, a critical point had passed: BP would not have to reopen the stack, and oil had finally stopped leaking from the Macondo well into the Gulf." That quotation comes from the just released report by the Oil Spill Commission, Stopping the Spill: The Five Month  Effort to Kill the Macondo Well. What a concise assessment of the generally clueless behavior of both public and private sector figures in this effort! They had successfully stopped the flow of oil into the Gulf of Mexico but the government's science advisory team did not realize BP had been successful. It did not fit their assumptions. The government overseers were unanimous that they ought to re-open the capping stack and let oil flow once again.  Divine Providence intervened and the "Nobel Prize winning physicist" and his team were convinced by Coast Guard Admiral Cook to keep to their promise and leave the stack closed for the full 24 hour design period of the well...(Read Full Post)