The tube is working. The tube isn't working . The tube is working as planned.

Here is the story from nola.com:
by Dennis Persica, The Times-Picayune

BP says tool is working 'as planned' to capture leaking oil in Gulf

A tool inserted into the leaking drill pipe on the floor of the Gulf of Mexico is pumping oil to a surface ship, a BP official said Sunday afternoon.
Kent Wells, BP's senior executive vice president, said the tool was inserted into the riser on the Gulf floor Saturday night.

However,"we were just starting to get oil to the surface when the tool got dislodged," he said.

The tool was reinserted Sunday morning and "It's working as planned," Wells said.

Both oil and natural gas are being pumped to the surface; the natural gas is being burned off while the oil is stored on a vessel, said Wells, who spoke at a news conference in Houston.

Wells said the insertion tool is extracting "some" of the flow from the leaking pipe.

"We will continue to increase the amount" of oil being extracted, but will do so slowly, Wells said. "It will take a little time.

"We will do everything we can to capture as much as possible," he said. He had no estimate on how much of the leaking oil is being captured by the tool.

The amount of oil and gas being pumped to the surface will be increased slowly. Wells said it has to be increased slowly or there is a danger the tool will take in seawater.

Ultimately, the plan is for BP to kill the well after the flow of oil can be slowed and encase the wellhead in concrete, Wells said.
There's more: http://www.nola.com/news/gulf-oil-spill/index.ssf/2010/05/bp_says_tool_is_working_but_ca.html

I went to this site because they are in the eye of this mess. The stories in other sources say it is succeeding. One I posted did say some. Succeeding is extremely misleading because people will think all the oil is being captured.

I should have gone to this site first. However, it's enlightening to see how it is being presented in the MSM.

After reading the story, it seems to be all three. The 'working as planned' is the scary part. If it leaks slowly, it is still leaking. I hope all of this works. Rube Goldberg would be proud.

They have to do the junk shot successfully.

Think exothermic properties.

That's what formed the clathrate crystals that clogged up the first, larger box they tried to use to encase the leak. The new assembly has a hot-water jacket to keep the temperature up but there's a limit to how well that can be expected to work, and the pressure definitely makes crystal formation a possibility. Since the crystals are a combination of methane and water, one way to avoid them is to make the hydrocarbon flow into the assembly as pure as possible; no water, no crystals.

nt

"BP Executives"