Another capping attempt, another failure, and now the Obama administration is preparing the American public for the worst: the possibility that BP's blown-out well could gush for another two months with near-apocalyptic impact on the Gulf of Mexico's environment and economy.
BP has scrapped its "top kill" effort to plug the well by injecting heavy drilling mud into it, and was preparing on Sunday to deploy another strategy: a cap that would allow the company to cover the well and siphon the crude into tankers waiting 1,500 metres above the sea floor.
But a senior White House official warned that BP is running out of options to contain the spewing oil, and the end may not come until it can complete the drilling of two relief wells, expected some time in early August.
"We are hoping for the best and preparing for the worst," Carol Browner, White House adviser on energy and the environment, told CBS's Face the Nation on Sunday. "The worst is that we have oil leaking until August, until the relief wells are done."
BP managing director Robert Dudley expressed some optimism that the next effort, known as a cap-containment system, would succeed even though a similar approach had to be abandoned two weeks ago when crystals formed and blocked the tubing. He said BP has devised a way to heat the tubing to keep ice crystals from forming.
But BP's credibility is in tatters. It had pegged chances of success from last week's top kill at 60 to 70 per cent, though Mr. Dudley said Sunday that the odds of success in that operation were a matter of "luck."
If crude continued gushing at its current rate of up to 800,000 gallons a day until August, it would be enough to fill 125 Olympic-sized swimming pools. That's the equivalent of an additional four Exxon Valdez-scale disasters, which was until this year the worst oil spill in U.S. history. In addition, the oil could be swept rapidly towards shore, or into the Gulf Stream and up the east coast by heavy storms. Hurricane season begins Tuesday.
Scientists are already warning the blowout will have devastating and long-term consequences on marine life in the Gulf, which supplies 30 per cent of the United States' shellfish, and threatens species such as bluefin tuna, sharks, dolphins and whales.
"The worst-case scenario is it would shut down our entire fisheries, and that would be catastrophic for decades. Absolutely," said Ewell Smith, director of the Louisiana Seafood Promotion and Marketing Board, an industry advocacy group. "It's very disturbing to even think about it."
Oil continues to wash to shore in the vulnerable marshlands of Louisiana, spotted along about 160 kilometres of coastline. Mr. Smith said the industry could "bounce back" if the leak were stopped shortly, as only 30 per cent of fishing waters are currently closed, but a more prolonged leak could destroy fisheries for years to come.
It's another blow to a state that has dealt with Katrina, Rita, Gustav and Ike, four devastating hurricanes in four years that have battered the coast.
"We've come through four major storms. The big difference with this and a storm is that when a storm comes, it's done. You pick up the pieces, and you move on," Mr. Smith said. "This just goes on and on."
The top official in coastal Plaquemines Parish said news of the top kill failure brought tears to his eyes.
"They are going to destroy south Louisiana. We are dying a slow death here," Billy Nungesser, the parish president, told The Associated Press. "We don't have time to wait while they try solutions. Hurricane season starts Tuesday."
While local residents fear the blackening seas, the blowout's impact will spread through the broader economy, affecting prices of consumer goods ranging from kilogram of shrimp to a litre of gasoline.
The longer the well spews crude, the greater an impact there will be on the oil industry and the greater the determination of Washington to minimize the risk of future accidents at all costs. But the only permanent solution remains the relief well, two of which are being drilled with hopes of one succeeding.
"That would kill it. The well would be dead," said Ted Bourgoyne, a professor emeritus of petroleum engineering at Louisiana State University.
The BP blowout could be to the oil industry what 2008 meltdown was to the financial industry: a fundamental re-evaluation of risk.
"Will the government be able to regulate risks of deep-water drilling without shutting it down?" said Robert Johnston, director of the energy practice at Eurasian Group, a risk management consultancy. In addition to more stringent and costly regulation, he said the offshore industry may face a flight of capital as investors seek to avoid the now-obvious risks inherent in extracting oil at such depths.
U.S. President Barack Obama has already ordered a moratorium on all new deep-water drilling in the Gulf and the suspension of 33 deep-water exploration wells that were already being drilled.
Mr. Johnston noted the regulatory impact will be felt far beyond the United States, and other oil-producing nations, including Canada, look to learn the lessons from the BP accident and strengthen their own regulatory oversight in the offshore oil sector.