to use it possibly in the coming weeks. the epa is testing it because the athe a whale works, almost like a giant fish. as a fish brings out the water and pues out through gills. in this situation, it s going to bring in some of the oil/water mix, skim it through the ship and then it s going to release a lot of the freshwater but it s going to keep the oil on board. when it s effective, if working properly, it could possibly clean out, get this, half a million barrels, not gallons or barrels per day. definitely could be a game changer. to give you an idea of how huge this happens to be, we throw out a number like, say, it s 1100 feet long. a lot of people think, what does that mean? think of this. you know the nimitz class of air class carriers, the nimitz class, the biggest carriers the navy has, these are bigger. they re bigger than the largest aircraft carrier the united states navy has deployed. it s an amazingly huge ship and hopefully be in service soon. soon and for a while.
potential to clean up the oil but it is not being employed. what is the hold-up? reporter: a lot of people have high hopes for that. the first 48 hours have been inconclusive and a spokesman for the owner of that giant rig, tmt shipping offshore, says it s because of weather which has made the seas rougher than usual. the point of the test sfaz to make operational test soez it is in the best shape possible for the conditions in the gulf. it is pretty cool how this tanker works. the officials say it operates very much like an actual whale, taking in water through a series of vents in the front and then pumping internally like a human heart. it takes in an oily water mix and spits out the water and keep the oil inside. this one tanker has the ability to suck up 250 times more oil than modified fishing vessels doing the very same job, campbell. and we re also, as we reported now hearing, the tar balls are washing up near texas beaches, at least they were over
we have oil around chandeleur island and our cleanup team is responding to that. in certain areas, what was originally reported as oil has been confirmed to be algae. offshore we did complete five successful burns yesterday. we actually skimmed over 17,500 barrels of an oily water mix. i would end by saying we are focused on stopping the floeshgs minimum migz the impacts environmental and economic, and about keeping the public informed of our activities. thank you. at this point we ll open up for questions. ray henry, associated prechlts condition you explain a little about the hydrate situation? what exactly happened last night and what the status of the dome is now? where do you go from here? yes. what we did last night was, we
to ensure we knew what was happening. it was then we detected two leaks and more recently this week the third leak. we ve learned more as we have gone through continued evaluation, technology assessments and scientific examination of what we re seeingen on the surface. on top of that, the president is talking about helping you guys out, meaning the coast guard, first responders to this, by bringing other aspects of the military to help you out. where will they be of the most help? and where are they going to be deployed as this disaster starts to grow and get closer to the coastlines? well, we have a number of different efforts that are ongoing. at sea, we re working to apply disbursements to break up the oil. there are skimming operations to collect the oil. we ve collected more than 20,000 barrels of oily water mix. that will be ongoing.
region. the undersea leak feeding this spill, still uncapped and efforts to slow the 200,000 gallons of oil a day have failed. we have a number of different efforts that are ongoing at sea. we are working to apply disbursements to break up the oil. there are skimming operations to collect the oil. we have collected more than 20,000 barrels of oily water mix. that will be ongoing. that s going to be sustained effort for quite a while to come. well, this morning, we are following the story like no one else can, bringing you the latest information on the efforts. our reynolds wolf is live along the louisiana coast. also, rob marciano standing by with crucial information about how important the weather is in terms of the operations today. suzanne malveaux live at the white house. we are also going to be talking to florida democratic senator,