This will be an all too short post, as really, it's just an update on the now failed cap on the leaking well in the Gulf of Mexico. 

The Times reported today that the vent on the cap that keeps crystal from forming had been damaged by an underwater accident (BP just can't catch a break!) and resulted in the decision to remove the cap for the time being. 

One interesting fact that needs following up on is the quote that "BP said it had been able to capture 16,665 barrels of oil through its containment cap, two-thirds of the total recovery operation".

Perhaps my math is wrong, but at 60K barrels of oil a day since the spill began, we've seen about 3.73 million barrels of oil spill into the Gulf. 

If 16,665 barrels have been contained, that's .45% of the total spill. And if the 16K barrels cleaned up represents two thirds of the recovery operation, that means a shocking .67% has been recovered. 

Well, maybe my math is wrong. What if the spill were only dumping 5,000 barrels a day, as was originally reported by BP? Well in that case the containment effort would have captured a whopping 7.81% of the oil. 

Which leads me to wonder, just what the hell IS happening in the Gulf right now?