Bay is ringed by globs of thick sticky tar

I was really unhappy to read that police in Marin county actually came and arrested or handcuffed the leader of a religious group that showed up and started bagging up the tar balls at Stinson beach, which were in a form that could be easily gathered.
Surely, the stuff is poisonous and you face it at your own risk, but don't they have anything better to do at this time? The ship should face the cost of paying for workers, but they're not going to get all of the oiled sediment. It will get mixed into the mud and remain as a toxic layer.
This reinforces the idea that the community is helpless and has no skills. Police should only warn about the risk of poisoning, and tell people not to dump it in the wrong places.

The use of myco-remediation was used in New Orleans and many other places and has been really effective. Mycoremediation is the use of mycelium for decomposing toxic wastes and pollutants. It was used for part of the Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska and officials were amazed at the results of the mushrooms actually eating the oil totally gone. Leading the way in toxic spills is Paul Stametes, who wrote the awesome book Mycellium Running: How Mushrooms Can Save The World. I believe that he is speaking at the GreenFest today. Someone talk to him about it!

Check out these articles: http://www.starhawk.org/permaculture/NOLA_bio_basics.html

Helping the Ecosystem through Mushroom Cultivation- Adapted from the article, "Earth's Natural Internet" by Paul Stamets, published in the Fall 1999 issue of Whole Earth Magazine http://www.fungi.com/mycotech/mycova.html
http://www.fungi.com/mycotech/mycova.html

OK, so I read in the SF Chronicle this morning that they're not letting volunteers get involved in the cleanup, then I read the comment here that said that volunteers in Marin were actually being arrested by the cops. The Chronicle mentions that NRC Environmental Services is doing the cleanup job, so I looked them up. It turns out that this company is a subsidiary of National Response Corporation, which in turn is part of SEACOR Holdings Inc., which, along with its affiliates, operates "one of the world's largest fleets of diversified marine support vessels primarily dedicated to supporting offshore oil and gas exploration and development in the US Gulf of Mexico, offshore West Africa, the North Sea, Mexico, the Far East and Latin America." (copied directly from their website at http://www.nrces.com/about.htm at the bottom of the page under "Family Ties"). Now I really don't like to get too deeply into conspiracy theories, but I smell a big fat rat. Am I wrong on this? In summary, the very same people who want to fuck up our planet through offshore oil drilling are taking over the cleanup of the bay? Not to mention the fact that the NTSB has taken over the investigation of the spill, and that entity is run by Bush appointees...

yes, nrc has a semi trailer at the GGNRA outside the wildlife meeting. i also shot a pic of a truck with Maine license plates and hazmat on it coming out of Muir beach.

liability is definitely on this and the response to the cleanup. welcome to privitization of disasters. notice the gov PR spins where they will use specific wording. its a mess or disaster, not a mishap or whatever other wording the gov puppets want to use to keep the public from understanding the real effects of what's occurred.

bunker fuel is highly toxic. they don't want untrained volunteers handling it because the long term health affects of touching it and even breathing it are deadly. i know it is hard but there are crews working on the clean up. it would be even worse if hundreds of people were allowed to "volunteer", ie: clean up tar on the beach with gardening gloves and shovels, and weeks later have all those people suffering from sores, respiratory problems or even long term serious health problems such as cancer.

please, there are ways to volunteer that don't involved coming in direct contact with the fuel.

I 'spose those of us who live by the spill should just hold our breath then. I heard on KPFA that we will know in a week how toxic the air is and how harmful it is to breath but no other news staion(as far as I know) has said any thing about it, which worries me. I know the oil must be toxic but two days after the spill I saw an "expert" on chanel 4 holding globs of oil in his hand. Maybe lots of years of college make you imune to toxin. I don't know what's happenin, but some thing smells like burning.