BP starts oil leak 'top kill' ---from ABC News

BP starts oil leak 'top kill'

By North America correspondent Craig McMurtrie

Live feed: Oil gushes from the busted wellhead at the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico (Reuters: BP)

An anxious wait is underway as BP attempts to execute what it calls a "top kill" of its leaking oil well in the Gulf of Mexico.

BP executives are warning that the complex mud-pumping process, which has never before been tried at this depth, is far from a sure bet.
Company chief Tony Hayward says it could take days before BP knows if it has worked.
Thanks to a BP-supplied feed of pictures from the bottom of the sea, US news networks have a front-row seat for the deepwater top kill.
After weighing up the risks, the embattled oil company and government scientists agreed to attempt to pump 50,000 barrels of heavy drilling mud 1.5 kilometres underwater into the damaged wellhead.
But it is not just BP which has a lot riding on this latest attempt to fix the oil spill.
As the crisis drags on, US president Barack Obama is under pressure from his own party over his handling of the crisis.
It has been 37 long days since the Deepwater Horizon rig explosion and Mr Obama says "nobody is more upset" than he.
"Ultimately, like any president when this happens on your watch, you're thinking how does this get solved?" he said.
Mr Obama has come under increasing fire for his handling of the disaster with Democrats and political commentators accusing him of being too measured.
None has been more strident than a former Clinton adviser, Democrat strategist and Louisiana native James Carville.
"People are crying, they're begging for something down here and he just looks like he's not involved in this," Mr Carville said.
"Man, you got to get down here and take control of this, put someone in charge of this thing and get this thing moving.  We're about to die down here."
The White House has responded, announcing that the president will make his second trip to Louisiana at the end of the week and tomorrow he is expected to announce a crackdown on offshore drilling operations, including a tougher inspections regime.
There are also growing calls for a criminal investigation and a congressional committee has released a paper, much of it based on an internal BP review, pointing to missed warning signs in the hours leading up to the rig explosion.
They include an unexpected loss of fluid in a riser pipe, a pressure test that returned an unacceptable result two hours before the explosion and concerns about testing and modifications carried out on the blowout preventer.
The Obama administration also continues to distance itself from the federal agency previously responsible for overseeing drilling operations.
"I think when inspectors are taking trips on company-paid jets to go to places like the Peach Bowl, I think that is absolutely wrong and reprehensible and indeed criminal, " interior secretary Ken Salazar said.
But for Mr Obama, as much as BP, choking off the leaking well is the number one priority and today's top kill is a moment of truth.
"If it's successful, and there are no guarantees, it should greatly reduce or eliminate the flow of oil now streaming into the Gulf from the sea floor and if it's not there are other approaches that maybe viable," Mr Obama said.