fisheries. the bird rescue. the international bird rescue. these are the challenges these folks face every day. one thing that struck me in talking with you before we came out to have this conversation was the amount of acrimony received on this. the reality is in the gulf is much more of an alliance and an incredible coming together to deal with this mess than in the corridors where people yell about it. it s so easy to play monday morning quarterback. nothing is perfect. it s like a war. these guys are there on the front lines. you go to an island like queen bess island. this is home to 3,000 of these pelicans. in 1963 this bird became extinct in the region. through an effort it was recovered. today we have 50,000. just taken off the endangered
habitat, we had the unique opportunity to travel with mike carlos, he s a biologist of louisiana s department of wildlife and fisheries and this is what we saw. this is how an oil spill destroys habitats and kills wildlife. where we re standing, and of course we can be here because we re traveling with officials from both the u.s. fish and wildlife service and the louisiana department of wildlife and fisheries. we are standing on queen bess island. 35 acres of rather unremarkable rock and grass. but when it comes to its contribution to the biodiversity in louisiana this is a precious place. from laughing gulls to royal turns, to the celebrated louisiana brown pelican, this is
there. i saw hard boom surrounding queen bess island where these pelicans nest and there was a big gap. nobody was attending to it. there s not enough equipment there. there should be flotilla ships. bp hasn t come on the program so let me play devil s advocate to speak for them. let me play devil s advocate. this is a huge operation, incredibly complex operation. they re working with a myriad of government agencies and myriad of people on the water. it s a hard thing to organize. they ve got to do we gave them a five-point plan. fight it offshore on the outer barrier island beaches, inland waterways, beaches and lakes and then in the marsh. those five themes have to be independent and be able to strike quickly when oil comes in. secondly, we have to have zones. you can t run one team for the whole coast of louisiana. this is my zone. i m going to attack it if it comes in. it s not going to beat us in this zone. put somebody in charge. give him the equipment he needs and let them
this saturday i want another meeting. i want answers. i want to know why it s taking two to three weeks to pick up oil and how do we cut that down to two to three days? two to three weeks is unacceptable. if we re ordering equipment, bringing it in from overseas, i don t care. i want a plan, two to three days. if not, give us the money and we ll make it two to three days. right now bp and the coast guard is blocking us from getting it done. it s too difficult to get things approved. you re out on the water almost every day. are you seeing booms in time? i m not seeing enough manpower, enough equipment. i was out there three hours friday afternoon. i saw a soft boom on a marsh island as if you were to crumple up toilet paper and throw it on the island. it was crumpled up and sat there. i saw hard boom surrounding queen bess island where these pelicans nest and there was a big gap. nobody was attending to it. there s not enough equipment there.
we have to deploy, contain, clean up a spill like this. it shows in the lackadaisical, uncoordinated, unprofessional way this inept technology has been deployed by bp. beaches have been fouled. wetlands have been destroyed wildlife has been killed that should have been saved. pensacola bay in florida if properly boomed should never have been breached by oil. pedido beach, queen bess island, barataria bay, none of these areas should have been breached by oil even given the sad state of existing technology to stop it. the fact they were breached was bp s human error. adds fake president i m announcing a command for cleanup of oil that has already entered the gulf of mexico with priority of protecting sherryline that