The world’s ongoing ecological disasters

[Forkboy]

NIGERIA

Disaster: Oil spills

Going since: Around 1966

Damage done: The Deepwater Horizon incident may have been the worst oil spill in U.S. history, but it pales in comparison to the ongoing catastrophe that has afflicted Nigeria's Niger River Delta over the last five decades. As many as 546 million gallons of oil are believed to have spilled since oil exploration began in this region -- the equivalent of an Exxon Valdez spill every year.

There are around 2,000 official spill sites in the region, some of them decades old.
Oil companies operating in the region blame thieves and sabotage for the majority of the spills, though local activists say aging equipment and lax safety are the cause of many of them. The number of severity of the spills may actually increase in coming years as the industry moves into more remote and difficult terrain in the delta.

It's not just the spilled oil that can be dangerous. Pipeline explosions, like in the one that killed more than 100 people outside Lagos in 2008, are increasingly frequent as well.

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2010/07/16/the_world_s_worst_ongoing_disasters

[blindpig]

1. k&r

Kill Capitalism

[MikeNY]

2. Sad conclusion from a lot of people

It seems like the sad conclusion a lot of people in the mainstream are making is that this is the "end of days" and that the 2012 Mayan prophecy is the reason for all of this. Since the world is going to end on December 21, 2012, this is why all of this crap is happening, and not runaway corporations and runaway government. Anyone here who is under 40 was warned in science class that we were depleting our fossil fuels. Why are we so surprised about this? Instead, a lot of people have gone into denial mode every time there is a forest fire, mega hurricane, report of glaciers melting, man-made disaster. They become ancient Mayan oracles.

[xchrom]

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