Rebecca Dunham
from the testimony of Micah Sandell, Steve Bertone, Douglas
Brown, & Randy Ezell, as recorded in the National Commission
on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill & Offshore Drilling’s
Report to the President.
up on the main deck I seen mud
shooting all the way up to the derrick gas
& smoke filled so loud like taking an air
hose & sticking it in your ear starboard
explosion knocked to the floor —fire—
to the back of the cab hands on my head
• •
a freight train thumping in my head
lights out a man so coated in blood
I had no idea who P.A. System: Fire.
Fire. Fire. taste & smell of fuel gas
fire from derrick leg to leg out the starboard
window They are all gone methane air
• •
in the engine control room loud air
leak sound the alarms wailed & I heard
well-control situation fell through subfloor
amid cable trays wires into the mud-
dark buried under ceiling gas
ripping engine rev a second blast fired
• •
look down in the moon pool only fire’s
solid sheet look up nothing here
but flames way past the crown deck gassed
slick 1 ½ inches deep —head
for the lifeboats abandon ship— mud
thick as mucus don’t slip starboard
• •
heat & smoke boiled from the rig sun-star
bright a blast furnace the fire
our only light I crawled over rubble
over a body I could feel the droplets of air
misting my skin methane heard
an ocean on fire a deafening roar of lit gas
• •
have we EDSed yes have we EDSed,
I have to be certain yes the control board
lit red debris-clogged ether the jumpers’ heads
visible amid the waves & on fire-
licked rafts the passengers rock in acrid air
We need a knife terror’s coat a dense mud
• •
on the Bankston a black torrent (head back
500 m.) an egret mud-covered on starboard deck
& that pyre the dead the very air we breathe
