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The count is now 18…18 straight weekdays that the crude oil polluting the Gulf of Mexico has been Story of the Day. CBS led with the visual angle--the appearance of slimed brown pelicans on Louisiana's beaches. NBC and ABC led with technology--BP's announcement that its robots had succeeded in cutting through the pipe out of which the crude was gushing. It is possible that the resulting jagged opening can now be fitted with a containment cap to prevent some oil from escaping into open water.

NBC's Kerry Sanders described the "heartbreaking discovery" on Louisiana's barrier islands. "Where the thick oil is lapping the shoreline, birds are trapped, dying in the ooze." CBS' Mark Strassmann called the day's images "troubling--and remember, this is a crisis with no end in sight…When you get a sense of the thickness of this crude you also start to understand something else: why this pelican never stood a chance and why so many other birds are now at risk as this oil keeps coming ashore."

Meanwhile NBC's Mark Potter and CBS' Kelly Cobiella were on the tourist beach in Pensacola waiting. Cobiella picked up on "a growing sense of hopelessness and doom." Potter found hotels "already reporting cancelations." Florida Panhandle tourism may suffer first but Cobiella foresaw miles and miles of tarnished beaches. She counted six different computer models, "all showing oil moving around south Florida and up the east coast."

Andrew Tyndall 6/8/10 7:00:16 pm

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