One of the areas hardest hit by the BP oil spill is Louisiana’s southernmost Parish located along the 70 miles of Mississippi river that empties into the Gulf of Mexico.
But the residents have something in their arsenal to help keep the oil out of their prized marshlands: Billy Nungesser. The parish president is a newcomer to politics who isn’t afraid to take on BP or the Coast Guard to save the livelihood of his home.
From an emergency management center, he recently ordered his staff to ignore BP and put parish equipment out in the water to suck up the oil: “I should have told them to get the hell out of the way two weeks ago, but we are putting [this] equipment and we’re putting the skimmers in the water. I don’t give a s – – – what anybody says.”
(READ the story from National Public Radio) …Thanks, also, to Roxana for submitting this New York Times article about the same story!