louisiana. hello, bill. how are you? >> fine. thank you very much. but for the second consecutive day, although the clouds are gone, the sup is shining, but the windows, as you can tell, are very strong and out there in the gulf of mexico where all of this oil now -- by u.s. coast guard estimates is still floating and encroaching towards the shore line of potentially five gulf states. the winds and the high waves of 6 and 7 feet are doing a disservice to efforts to try to contain and disperse and collect the oil that is out there floating in the water. there are more than 200,000 feet of coastal pipe, coastal boom lines that fed out, bright orange, protecting the coast lines. but because of the high winds and the surge in the waves, yesterday there were several breaches in that coast line and, of course, you may be familiar with the first video we saw of a little bird that was actually found out at sea, normally white in color, but it was being cleaned up by volunteers covered in brown oil. now, taking a look at a graphic that we've got here to show you the size and scope of this particular spill compared to others. this one so far between 1.6 million gallons of oil out there in the ocean and the gulf of mexico, up to 2.1 million. depending on exactly when the three cracks in the pipeline ruptured. compared to the 8.7 million that leaked from all of the damaged offshore oil rigs during hurricane katrina and rita and exxon valdez back in 1989. 11 million gallons spilled in alaska. clearly you look at the top bar, this particular spill has the potential to go up to 12 to 19 million gallons spilled in there. however, i just spoke with a british petroleum spokeswoman who says yesterday, their initial test for the first time try to take the chemical dispersals, typically applied by spraying them by air, they're piped in, 5,000 feet down, operated by a robot. they say that it appeared when the chemicals went into the water, the oil coming out of those cracks appeared to disperse a mile below the surface. they're now working with the government to see whether they can do this on a large scale. they felt it was promising. >> and phil, quickly, the way this gets better real fast is if they can shut off the flow completely. what are the efforts underway to do that and how far away are we? >> they are underway, but again, this is day 11 of trying to do exactly that or day nine actually after the rig collapsed. so far the best minds in the oil industry have been unable to do it and they're hoping for the best. that's all i can tell you. >> all right. phil keating, we'll check back in throughout our broadcast. thank you very much. later today, we expect to learn more about exactly where the president will be along the gulf coast. his trip was announced shortly before the start of the university of michigan's graduation ceremony. mr. obama has wrapped up his remarks. mike tobin is there and joins us now. hello, mike. >> hello, brian. and the information that the president is going to the gulf tomorrow was coupled by the information that he will travel with a small foot print. indicating that the president is not going to travel with a large entourage that would distract from the cleanup effort itself. as far as the comments that the president made here in ann arbor, he only addressed the oil cleanup briefly when he was defending his policies of greater government involvement. saying it's the government that builds roads and employs police officers, it's the government that insures safety standards are adhered to and mine and the government that insure has big company that causes an oil spill will be responsible for cleaning that oil spill up. let me jump topics briefly here because the 92,000 people who came here to brave the rain in ann arbor to hear from the president here in michigan, the state hardest hit by unemployment, of course, wanted to hear guarantees that these graduates here would get some jobs. the president addressed that talking about the fact that they are emerging in the greatest -- emerging from the greatest economic crisis this country has seen since the great depression and he encouraged the graduates here to participate more. brian? >> all right. mike tobin is on the job in ann arbor, michigan today with the president. the president now going down to the gulf coast tomorrow with a very small foot print. thank you very much. by the way, if you want to see all the graduation activities at the university of michigan, you can watch them on foxnews.com. to pick up on our continuing coverage from the gulf coast, we go now to jonathan who is live in dolphin island, alabama, where the shore lines are being prepped for damage from the oil. jonathan, set the scene, tell me what's going on there. >> certainly, brian. if you look behind me, you can see those orange floating devices. those are booms, oil containment booms, the contractors with bp spent the past few days installing them. the idea that if the spill came into this region, that it would prevent the oil from coming ashore. but today we've noticed that there appears to be a breach in some of these booms. some of the booms appear to be dislodged. there has been heavier than usual surf. we've been experiencing battering winds and also higher than usual spring tides. those forces of nature together appear to be dislodging some of these booms. it's unclear how successful they'll be in preventing the oil from coming ashore and obviously a very serious concern on dolphin island, brian. >> a couple of questions. how far do you believe the slick is from your position where you are now right down there on the tip of alabama? >> it's hard to predict. current estimates it is expected to come near the shore here on dolphin island sometime late this weekend. perhaps late sunday, perhaps during the overnight hours, early monday, brian. >> and what are they saying about how this is impacting the oil industry's image in that area? it's an important industry. it supplies a lot of jobs. people have got to be concerned about this. >> yeah. it does indeed. people are couching their criticism because along with the fishing industry and tourism, it does provide a lot of jobs. a lot of people here are not opposed to offshore drilling, but you're hearing a lot of them saying that they thought that the oil companies were taking more precautions and they are coming down hard on these oil companies for not doing more to safeguard against this type of spill. they're not opposed to offshore drilling, but they want to make it safer. >> we have continuing team coverage with jonathan and bill keating and a whole host of others working this story and they'll continue to come back throughout our broadcast. right now, we want to move on. this is a fox news alert. the search for a group of drug smugglers suspected of shooting a sheriff's deputy in arizona. the deputy was shot above his kidney. police tracked down the wounded deputy through his cell phone. he was found after an hour and air lifted to the hospital. officials are looking for five heavily armed suspects, no arrests have been made at this time. over the past few years, a number of people attending the immigration may day protest has sort of dwindled. but in the wake of the arizona immigration law, huge crowds are expected to hit the streets today. fox use casey stegall is in the middle of all the action in phoenix, arizona and joins us with the very latest. how are you doing, casey? >> hey, brian. good to see you. it's sort of the calm before the storm. not to sound trite. no one really here at the state house right now. but that is certainly going to change. this is a very special may day for immigration rights activists here in the phoenix area. a lot of steam has been building behind this issue, not really just in the state of arizona, but the rest of the country, as it's only been a week and one day since that controversial immigration reform bill was put into law here. it allows police officers to essentially act as border patrol agents, asking to see immigration paperwork if a person is suspected of being in arizona illegally. opponents say it's racial profiling. this is video from outside the state house the day governor brewer signed the law. police had riot gear and it got a little heated, which is why they're prepared today in case the may day protests get out of control because there is just a few hours, thousands will march from downtown phoenix to the capitol lawn to have their voices heard. >> i feel like it's going to be huge because this immigration bill was just passed by our governor. i feel like it will be huge. i hope a lot of people come out to speak their mind about this. >> other rallies are planned today across the united states. in los angeles, they're expecting, up to 100,000 people. but police say it's more like 60,000. you may recall it was 2007 when these protests sparked violence in los angeles when then president bush was pushing for federal immigration reform. a few people even journalists were injured in that. phoenix police are saying they don't expect 100,000 people here today. they don't even expect 60,000, but they are prepared for a large scale crowd if that happens. a real quick update on the bill itself, three formal lawsuits have been filed already challenging this law that goes into effect officially at the end of june. it could be an interesting day here in phoenix. brian, we'll be here and we'll keep you posted throughout the day on fox news. >> casey stegall, thank you very much. the arizona immigration law has sparked a lot of criticism. you may have heard that former colorado congressman, a supporter of tighter border security was one of that's critics. but wait a minute. former congressman says he's been grocery misquoted and joins me from colorado springs. he wants to get on the record and set it straight. where did you get misquoted? who is responsible for saying otherwise? >> i did an interview in denver i think saturday with a number of television stations about this issue. and at one point i was asked by one of those stations about the possibility of having people pulled over just because they were hispanic or looked like an illegal immigrant. i said, well, of course, that's not the law. i would never support a law like that. i wouldn't support one in colorado. i certainly wouldn't support one in arizona. someone, a blogger, took that -- the last half of the sentence -- of the statement there that i would never support a law like that. and i don't want it here or arizona and put a caption on -- put a headline on top of it and said, tancredo says arizona law goes too far. use that had quote, got picked up by the huffington post and there you go. it's all over the place. >> once it's in the blog area, it's hard to kill off. for the record, you support that arizona law very strongly. >> absolutely. >> why do you think it's a good idea? because a lot of people are saying it's not a good idea. >> brian, i tell you, i've been in this game a long time. in this debate for a long time also. it has been my experience that the reaction on the left and on the pro-open border side of the debate to any proposal to tighten down on illegal immigration, the hysteria with which that proposal is met on the left is in direct proportion to the possibility of that proposal being effective. the more effective that proposal will be and reducing illegal immigration in the country, the more hysterical the left reacts to it. they use this ruse in this case, of people being pulled over, of their civil rights being violated and all that stuff. people driving down the street and somebody says, that looks like an illegal alien, pull them over. that's specifically a prohibited thing in the bill. but they won't tell you that. they just use the argument to get out in the streets. but behind it, truthfully is this: most of these people out there, certain leah say every one of them, but all the people you see on these films and all the people out there today who are going to protest are doing so because down deep, they believe this might work and other states might employ it. >> congressman, tom, we want to thank you for joining us on america's news room. >> i want to thank you for letting me be on there. >> that's what we're here for. thanks a lot. state officials say at least one person was killed by tornadoes in central arkansas last night. the disaster also injured two dozen people and destroyed several homes. look at that image. right now rescue teams are searching for anyone who might still be trapped. according to the national weather service, another round of storms could hit the same region later today. there is a lot of extreme weather to talk about today. high winds are seriously slowing down efforts to contain the oil spill along the gulf coast. chief meteorologist rick at the fox weather center is here. >> such a rough weekend for a lot of people. the winds now out of the southeast, actually been consistent since thursday, coming across the gulf, what's gone up is the wind speed. winds around 30 to 35 miles an hour at times, moving that oil slick, continuing up in across areas of the gulf, by later today or tomorrow, potentially we see maybe across the mississippi and alabama coast line with these kinds of winds. by monday into tuesday, we start to see an you've shore flow. this is a long term issue. we'll be dealing with this. this ebb and flow where the offshore versus onshore winds will be changing for quite a while. another big story is the potential for a major severe weather outbreak. we have a tornado watch box in effect, two of them across areas of the south and i got to tell you, a very dangerous potential situation here east of the memphis area with a tornado warning. i think we could be seeing damage come out from this one. if you are in this tennessee area right now, western tennessee, you need to take cover. i want to take a look at exactly what we'll be watching. the severe weather today, a high risk for severe weather has been issued by the storm prediction center. that's where you see the bold of white, includes parts of mississippi, arkansas, boot hill of missouri and western tennessee. we'll be dealing potentially with large long lived tornadoes. that's exactly what weigh saw last week with the tornado in mississippi. >> all right. rick will stay all over that. thank you. very appreciate it. look, there is one overriding story today and that is what's going on in the gulf of mexico. from louisiana to the panhandle of florida, they are bracing for an eco logical disaster of tremendous magnitude as crews continue to try to shut shut down that leaking oil well. we'll have all the coverage that we can possibly jet up right here on america's news headquarters. stay where you are. brian wilson in washington for two hours today, back in just a moment. states of emergency exist in four states right now because of the bp oil spill, louisiana, mississippi, alabama, and florida, are all bracing for what is on pace to become the worst u.s. oil disaster since the exxon valdez spill in 1989. we now know federal authorities have shut down two offshore platforms and evacuated one in the gulf of mexico as a precaution. the coast guard says they are just being extra careful. at this point, you're looking at google earth satellite images of the spill from space which shows the slick steadily moving toward the coast line. it all depends on when. the very latest on the spill, the coast guard estimates at least 1.6 million gallons of oil have now spilled into the gulf. some say it could be more. the oil slick is 130 miles long, 70 miles wide and is expected to keep moving up the eastern coast of louisiana today. more than 1900 people, 300 vessels and dozens of aircraft are trying to contain it, but as i said, high winds are causing a real problem here. the direction of the wind, very critical as to where that slick comes ashore. the efforts to clean up continues, but how do those oil skimming vessels work? laura ingle went on board and met the crew. she has the story from cape may, new jersey. >> oil skimming is one of the more basic, but reliable methods of removing floating oil from the water. earlier today, we took a ride aboard this oil skimming vessel called the lynn frank to see how it works. this 110-foot oil spill recovery vessel known as an osrv, can skim oil using two methods. the first by placing a secondary vessel in the water called a belt skimmer that has a floating oil boom. right now the belt skimmer is starting to skim the water. now, in a real situation, oil would be skimmed off the top of the water and then picks up on that belt and pumped into the boat. one of the biggest challenges for oil skimming crews is the weather. when waves pick up, operations slow down. >> it's not necessarily the boats themselves. it's because the oil is floating on top of the water. with the wave action, they aren't effective as far as picking up the oil. you'll end up getting more water than oil. >> the other way to skim is the rope mop system. is gets down into the water to absorb the oil, comes back up, then the oil is wrung out and pumpd into a tank on board. >> bring her back the other way! >> oil can't be skimmed. the next best thing is try to keep it contained with something called an ocean oil containment boom. that's 2500 feet of 42-inch boom that you see up on that rielle. right now a support vessel is being used to unfurl this boom. it's being pulled out into the water, coralling what would be oil if we were in an oil situation. crews can do a couple of things. they can burn it, skim it or move it. just to give you an idea of how much the oil skimming operation will be down in the gulf, the cost of operating this boat you see here behind me is $9,700 a day. that's not including the price of fuel, which can reach up to $3,000 a day. in cape may, new jersey, laura ingle, fox news. >> eric boling is a reporter for the "fox business" network with more than 20 years of experience covering the oil industry. he joins us now from new york. i know that bp is going to pay for the cost of all of this. but it's going to be significant and the oil industry as a whole is going to take a pretty good hit. >> there are a lot of impacts. environmental impact, there is economic impact, and there is going to be political impact and fallout. bp, they're going to pay through their teeth. they're going to get raked over the coals, but they need to. this is a bp problem. this isn't an oil drilling problem. this isn't an exploration problem. they had an oil platform that was floating on top of the water with a drill bit into the ground. there is supposed to be a shut-off valve. the way i understand it, there is a shut-off valve at the sea bed. the problem is it's frozen open. so bp needs to get people down there, shut that valve off or worse case, somehow find a way to trap the oil that's leaking. this is going to be on their neck. this is going to be on their dime. it's going to cost them a lot of money. that's fine. let's just make sure we don't change our oil drilling agenda because of this one spill. >> yeah. there is some larger issues. the president had talked about opening up the drilling. that seems to be an issue that may be revisited as we say here in the nation's capitol. but also talk to me about this, if you don't care at all about the gulf coast, and i can't imagine there is anybody watching who doesn't. but even if you didn't care about that, this could hit you at the pump. >> not only could, it will hit you at the pump. here is why. let's say they freeze, put a moratorium. david axelrod yesterday side we're going to probably put a moratorium on for now. at the white house yesterday, also said we may not open any new offshore drilling until we find out what happened here. that alone wil