The Mobile Press Register had two reports:
Beaches turn black: The picture that I posted yesterday was only the beginning of the problem for Gulf Shores and Orange Beach.
Thousands of people lined Gulf Shores’ beaches, but almost no one dared even put a toe in the water. In an unprecedented day for oil in Alabama, large pools of black crude gathered on the shore. Farther east, from Orange Beach to Perdido Pass, clumps of oil washed up on the black-speckled coast.
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Pipe boom plan at Perdido Pass:
With lightweight boom no match for the swift current in Perdido Pass, a $4.6 million project will extend a barrier of steel pipes for more than half a mile in an effort to keep oil out of wetlands and waterways to the north.
The floating pipes — a yard in diameter and filled with polystyrene foam — will be suspended from chains attached to two rows of pilings driven into the bottom of the pass, according to plans submitted to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.