"It took 30 days for the oil to reach Grand Isle once the leak started," said Mark Becnel as he ate dinner at the Starfish restaurant on Grand Isle, where fishing, tourism and oil are the lifeblood of the people.

"Even once they've shut off the leak, it'll be another 30 days at least before we're out of the woods," he said.

BP announced earlier Saturday that its "top kill" effort to stop oil gushing into the Gulf had failed.

"Top kill", said BP executives when they launched their then latest bid to halt the worst oil spill in US history, had worked around the world, but never been tested at the depths of the BP well at the heart of the Gulf of Mexico spill, which lies a mile (1,600 meters) below the surface.

The principle of "top kill" was to pump drilling mud into the pipe at higher pressure than the oil and gas are coming out. The mud is forced in from the top, and when it overcomes the gas and oil, a cement plug is inserted and the well is considered "killed."

To Starfish waitress Sam, it wasn't rocket science.

"I didn't go to college or study engineering but I knew (top kill) wouldn't work because of the pressure from the gas and oil," she said.

An estimated 29.5 million gallons of oil have spewed into the Gulf of Mexico since a ruptured pipe a mile below the surface began gushing crude after an explosion on board BP's Deepwater Horizon nearly six weeks ago.

The blast killed 11 rig workers and sent the platform sinking to the sea floor.

Billy Nungesser, president of Plaquemines Parish, which is home to the port of Venice, said he was devastated by the death of "top kill".

He learned the news as he was about to address the crowd at the annual seafood festival in the parish.

"My knees got weak. I looked out into the crowd and I forgot what I was going to tell them. I didn't have the heart to tell those people it failed," Nungesser said on CNN.

BP and federal authorities are now turning to a new strategy to mitigate the leak, but it will take at least four to seven days before it can be put into place and Nungesser warned Sunday that Louisiana's unique wetlands were in mortal danger.

Already, thick oil has invaded the marshes at Pass a Loutre, 10 miles (16 kilometers) south of Venice.

"Every time oil takes out a piece of the marsh, a piece of Louisiana is gone forever," Nungesser said.

"We are playing Russian roulette with our lives, with our community, and with the wetlands that supply all the nutrients for all the fish in the whole Gulf of Mexico."

Even though there are few visible signs of the oil slick at Grand Isle -- the sea waters are clear, the beach has been cleared of tar balls, there are no oiled birds or dead marine life -- the impact of the spill was almost instantaneous.

Sam the Starfish waitress said she made 200 dollars the Saturday night before BP reported in late April that oil was spewing from a ruptured pipe on the sea floor, and the tables were always full.

"Then this happened and it all stopped. This place should have every table full tonight. We have five customers," said the young mother of three, who didn't want to give her last name.

A few blocks up the road from the Starfish, Lawrence and Judith Saddler stood at the top of a grassy dune overlooking one of Grand Isle's beaches as the sun set.

The couple from Victoria, Texas had come to Grand Isle -- the only human-inhabited spot in Louisiana to have been directly affected by the oil spill so far -- "because this is a historic landmark now," Lawrence Saddler said.

"We've also come to spend some money here, so that we can help them out a bit," he said.

At the bottom of the dune, a handwritten sign read "beach closed."

earlier related report
'Top kill' fails to stop Gulf oil leak, new plan readied
Robert, Louisiana (AFP) May 30, 2010 - BP's "top kill" operation to plug the ruptured well in the Gulf of Mexico has failed in a stunning setback to efforts to stem the worst oil spill in US history.

BP and federal authorities said Saturday they are now turning to a new strategy to stop the leak, but it will take at least four to seven days before it can be put into place.

At least 20 million gallons are now estimated to have gushed into the ocean since the disaster unfolded five weeks ago, threatening an environmental and economic catastrophe across hundreds of kilometers of the US Gulf Coast.

"After three full days of attempting 'top kill,' we have been unable to overcome the flow from the well, so we now believe it's time to move on to the next of our options," BP Chief Operations Officer Doug Suttles told a press briefing.

President Barack Obama called the developments "enraging" and "heartbreaking."

Engineers had spent days pumping some 30,000 barrels of heavy drilling fluid into the leaking well head on the ocean floor in a high-pressure bid to smother the gushing crude and ultimately seal the well with cement.

But the effort failed, and when asked specifically why, Suttles had no direct answer.

"We don't know that for certain," he said.

The announcement marks the latest failure for BP, which despite a series of high-tech operations over the past month has appeared powerless to bring the disaster to heel since an explosion on the BP-leased Deepwater Horizon oil rig April 20 which killed 11 workers. The rig sank two days later.

The British energy giant had stressed that "top kill" was the best chance at stopping the leak other than drilling an entirely new relief well, a process that has already begun but is expected to take another two months.

"Obviously, we're very disappointed in today's announcement and I know all of you are anxious to see this well secured," US Coast Guard Rear Admiral Mary Landry told the briefing.

Efforts will now focus on severing the damaged riser pipes that lay crumpled on the ocean floor, then installing a containment device that could capture the leaking oil and syphon it to the surface.

The new containment plan, scheduled to begin next week, is called the "Lower Marine Riser Package Cap (LMRP Cap)."

It is a complex operation that will be carried out by remotely operated robots on the ocean floor, BP officials said -- nearly one mile (1.6 kilometers) below the spot where the drilling rig exploded.

The robots, wielding cutting tools, will sever the bent riser pipe and replace it with the LMRP cap, BP officials say.

The cap will then be connected to a riser leading to the drill ship Enterprise, nearly above the robots.

Suttle said that even if LMRP works, it will only contain a majority of the oil and not all of it.

The setback came a day after Obama visited the region for the second time since the spill began 40 days ago, in an attempt to bring new urgency to the response.

Obama toured some of the affected areas in Louisiana on Friday and pledged to do whatever it takes to help Americans whose livelihoods have been upended by the spill.

On Saturday, the president said the new approach envisioned by BP was "not without risk" and has never been attempted before at this depth.

But he reiterated his determination to get the situation under control.

"It is as enraging as it is heartbreaking, and we will not relent until this leak is contained, until the waters and shores are cleaned up, and until the people unjustly victimized by this manmade disaster are made whole," Obama said.

He ordered Interior Secretary Ken Salazar and other top environmental officials to return to the region next week to continue their work aggressively responding to the spill.

Since it began, an estimated 12,000 to 19,000 barrels of crude have been gushing into the Gulf each day.

The disaster has already closed stretches of coastal fishing waters, endangering the seafood industry and tourism, and threatening a catastrophe for Louisiana marshes, home to many rare species.

Government data released Thursday suggested between 18.6 million gallons and 29.5 million gallons of oil have poured into the Gulf -- far more than the roughly 11 million gallons of crude spilled in the 1989 Exxon Valdez disaster.

Amid the environmental catastrophe, there were also growing fears for the health of cleanup workers exposed to the oil and chemical dispersants.

Four more crewmen aboard ships helping burn off surface oil were evacuated to hospital late Friday after falling ill, a day after the Coast Guard announced that seven workers were evacuated for medical emergencies.

Meanwhile, The New York Times, citing internal company documents, reported Sunday that BP had serious concerns about the the Deepwater Horizon rig, but still broke its own safety policy.

The documents also showed that BP was worried about safety on the rig far earlier than it let on to Congress in hearings earlier this week, the paper reported.

On June 22, 2009, BP engineers expressed concerns that the metal well casing the company wanted to use might collapse under high pressure, according to The Times.

However, the company went ahead with the casing after getting special permission from BP colleagues because it violated the company's safety policies and design standards, according to the report.

The internal reports do not explain why the company allowed for an exception, the paper said.

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