For one, I think that this was caused by a series of issues mostly related to how BP was running the company. First, they gave the company setting up the rig inaccurate engineering diagrams for the equipment they were using. This meant that, if something went wrong, the engineers on the rig wouldn't have the information necessary to fix it in time. Second, BP gave that company extremely unrealistic expectations regarding setting up the rig, to the point where corner cutting was required, or the company would be forced off and replaced. This was so bad that one of the lead engineers, on his last bit of vacation, put his things in order, drew up his first (and final) will, warned his wife about the troubles they were facing, and went back, only to die on his last day on the job, preventing several hundred other workers from dying with him.
Then, when it actually happened, BP essentially lied about the amount of oil spilling into the gulf. While they may have been doing their best, the fact that their initial estimate put it at 1000 gallons a day, and current estimates vary from 20,000 to 50,000 gallons a day, they were definitely not telling the truth. Add to that their ineffective cleanup and containment practices, along with an oil dispersant almost as bad for the environment as the oil itself, and you have a serious ecological disaster on your hands. Add on to that the fact that the oil is STILL spilling into the gulf, faster than ever, and their current solution will take literally MONTHS to implement, and you have a seriously fucked up ecodisaster on your hands.
This is the kind of thing that makes me want to have the government force a company to liquidate ALL of its assets just to fix what they screwed up, and damned with what the CEO thinks on the matter. At this point, I don't care if it was a series of mistakes that most people could make if they were put in the right situations, and instead, I would rather see this thing fixed as best we can. While we can't restore the environment to the way it was, we can at least work toward that goal.
And before anyone suggests nuking the site, don't. It wouldn't work. It wouldn't seal off the well, and would effectively crack it and make the leak even worse. Add on to that the fact that it would violate international treaties signed by the heads of most nations in the world, and whoever nukes it will end up in some pretty hot water, internationally. Plus, there's no guarantee they'd even be able to get the nuke to detonate at 5000 feet underwater. Problems caused by the pressure, potential leaks, etc. might render the bomb a dud long before it was able to serve its new purpose.
