With New Year's Day only hours away, we continue to look back at the year 2010.
One story, that could have a big impact for years to come, was the Gulf Coast oil spill
As flames and panic cut through the darkness of the Gulf, Tom Hickey, a US Coast Guard pilot recalls, “"The rig was just fully engulfed, flames about 300 feet in the air."
Eleven men were killed in the explosion on the deepwater Horizon rig, a ball of fire lighting the night sky for miles.
Hickey continued, "It just was surreal. Something I have never seen before."
And a lingering problem was already beginning to seep through, a mile beneath the water's surface.
Doug Suttles, CEO of BP gave a statement saying, " We have people working 24 hours a day in four different locations, to stop the flow, to actually fight this thing offshore and protect the shoreline."
Slowly and deliberately, it began to bubble to the surface.
President Barack Obama issued a statement saying, "My administration will continue to use every available resource at our disposal.
A fishing guide said, "If it hits our marsh. 5-10 years and I won't be fishing. That would be devastating."
Two weeks after the leak began, the President made his first trip to the spill zone. President Obama saw fishing waters along the Coast were closed as the oil continued to spread…pockets of crude above and below the surface, spreading into the wetlands and washing-up on beaches.
Billy Nungesser, Plaquemines Parish president said, “We're going to hold their feet to the fire to make sure they're there until all of the oil is gone out of the Gulf of Mexico."
Everything that could go wrong, did go wrong." Critics battered BP and the White House for not doing enough. President Obama responded by saying, "I don't sit around talking to experts because this is a college seminar. We talk to these folks because they potentially had the best answers, so I know whose ass to kick."
But the only kick felt in the Gulf region seemed to be to the stomach of those who lived on, and from, the water.
Crews worked through failed attempts to seal the fractured well including a containment cap, a top hat, top kill and junk shot.
The companies that worked and managed the deepwater Horizon rig looked to shift the blame.
Rep. Henry Waxman, (D) California asked, "Did BP make a fundamental misjudgment?"
Tony Hayward, CEO of BP said, “I was not involved in that decision so it's impossible for me to answer that question” as the crude continued to choke-off the wildlife and wetlands in the heart of one of America's most unique and precious resources..
Oceanographer, Philippe Cousteau said, "Once the oil gets into these very fragile, very important eco systems, it will be there for years and possibly decades, having long term impacts."
July 15th, 85 days after the explosion, engineers shutdown all of the valves on a new, tight-fitting containment stack and for the first time in nearly three months, there was no oil leaking into the gulf. Twenty days later, more than 70 barrels of cement were pumped through a relief well creating a permanent seal. But, that was, by no means the end of the struggle.
Ryan Lambert, from Cajun Fishing Adventure said, "We're way, way, way away from it being finished up, cleaned up, whatever they want to call it. It's gonna be a long, long term battle."
A fight that continues along the Gulf Coast.
