Скачать или смотреть Visualizing how big the BP Oil Spill is

This video provides a visual representation of just how big the BP oil spill might get. It assumes worst case of 19,000 barrels spilled per day, just under 800,000 gallons, over a little more than 4 months. This would mean about 100 million gallons spilled into the gulf.

The math behind the size of the leak is simple. Each gallon of oil takes up 0.133680556 cubic feet. It's basic math from there to get the length of each side of the cube needed to contain the oil.

The size of the spill is then compared to US annual oil consumption to help give the spill some perspective. I didn't do this to try to play down the size of the BP oil spill. It's merely a way to try to conceptualize just how big the leak is. This video doesn't attempt to measure the environmental impact of the spill, only its volume.