Deepwater Horizon fire

The date is TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 10. Time: 7:00 p.m. Shepherd of the Hill Presbyterian Church, 145 Engler Blvd. in Chaska, MN. The Topic: Beyond Environmental and Human Extraction: Deepwater Horizon Three Years Later.

Here’s why this is worth your time (a quote from the MinnPost commentary):

“They call the oil rigs “rigs” for a reason. The whole thing is rigged.

“If we see a stranger on what used to be Isle de Jean Charles; if we see canals still crisscrossing through the marsh; if we’ve seen the fires of Deepwater Horizon light up the Gulf of Mexico and slick the waters and estuaries with black gold; if we’ve seen the evidence of breaking-and-entering in the house of the Gulf Coast waters, if we see empty oyster shells where once there were oysters; if we’ve heard about the oil companies hiding without anyone playing seek, we can ignore the game or we can seek and find for the sake of survival.”

Yesterday’s New York Times published Gulf Spill Sampling Questioned. Click THIS LINK to read the story. Researchers found a higher level of contamination than federal agencies did in water, sediment and seafood samples taken in 2010 after the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig explosion in the Gulf of Mexico.

Our speakers for this Dialogues event, Kris Peterson and Richard Krajeski, are there in the field. They split their time as researchers and disaster recovery professionals with the University of New Orleans’ Center for Hazards Assessment, Response, and Technology (CHART) and serving as pastors to the Bayou Blue Presbyterian Church of Gray, Louisiana. Kris and Dick work most closely with the subsistence communities of the Louisiana Delta, including the Isle de Jean Charles Biloxi-Chitimacha-Choctaw, whose traditional homeland is disappearing.

Hope to see you there.