Shortly after the beginning of the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill, boingboing quoted someone who said that the event was America's Chernobyl. Chernobyl was an event that, for practical purposes, permanently contaminated huge amounts of land, rendering it either completely uninhabitable or unsafe. Agriculture in parts of Europe as far away as Britain and France is continually monitored for radiation levels. The event was cataclysmically far-reaching and helped to hasten the demise of the Soviet Union, then one of the world's only two superpowers. As such, many scoffed at the comparison, including me.

I also scoffed because I feel nuclear power is generally safe when handled properly. The analysis of Chernobyl reads like a comedy of errors: no containment structure; a positive void coefficient; poorly trained staff; and a pseudo-scientific experiment that seemed like an open invitation for armageddon. Most of the world's nuclear power stations are run with far more respect for the power and poisons they yield. That being said, at some point people must ask themselves if the risks outweigh the gains.

Now, a full three weeks after the initial incident, the oil is still flowing into the Gulf of Mexico. Initial estimates were 5,000 barrels per day, then 10,000, then 25,000. Some scientists estimate that the number is even higher. Chemical dispersants are being used to break up the oil so that it doesn't reach the surface and create a slick. Nevertheless, that oil, and the toxic dispersants, remain in the Gulf underwater, where it can cause just as much if not more environmental harm than the much less media-friendly oil slick on the surface. The slick itself is easily visible from space and is larger than the U.S. state of Maryland.

But this isn't just an "Oh no, what a bad thing we humans did" scenario like the Exxon Valdez disaster. A growing number of scientists are becoming VERY WORRIED about the state of affairs.

You see, as the oil blasts out into the ocean unrestricted, it carries bits of sand with it. That high-pressure oil and sand mix acts like a sandblaster to slowly wear away what remains of the well's blowout cap. Already, it has come to light that the U.S. government is concerned that the cap could eventually be blown away entirely, causing the well to become an uncontrollable, deep-sea gusher.

If this happens, scientists say, the Gulf of Mexico's Loop Current could spray oil all throughout the Atlantic Ocean, and further currents would carry some of it everywhere else.

That would almost certainly cause a mass extinction event the scale of which humans have never seen, and would radically decrease the liveability of our planet for us resource-intensive humans. This would make the environmental mess of Chernobyl look like a stain on the carpet when your house is burning down.

Am I telling you this because I'm a fear monger? Because I like brandishing a sign that says "The End is Near"? No, there's still plenty of time to stop this from becoming a global environmental catastrophe. But BP and the US government need to stop dicking around and come up with a plan to stop the flow of oil sooner rather than later. Countries around the world need to start demanding a fix before the situation threatens us all.

I will have more to say on this matter, because the media seems to think that this has become a "stale story" or "just another oil spill". It's much bigger than that, and only by putting pressure on those responsible can we make sure it does not reach its terrifying paramount.

UPDATE 05/14: Discover magazine cites some sources that say the rate of flow is in fact much higher that originally estimated. The fact that BP has admitted that the reservoir probably contains at least 10 million barrels (about 1.6 billion litres) of oil, combined with the fact that experts admit that we have no idea what it will take to stop this gusher makes for very sobering considerations indeed.

UPDATE 05/15: The Wikipedia article on the Ixtoc I oil spill make for interesting reading. Apparently in 30 years we've learned absolutely nothing. It took them nine months to seal their wellhead.