By: Kenny Jordan/AESC Executive Director
July/August 2010

As we watch the BP incident continue to unfold in the Gulf of Mexico, I am astounded by the news media and their coverage of the event. When word came of the disaster in the Gulf with the loss of lives, I was actually in Washington, D.C. visiting with our various state Representatives, Senators, and their staffs during our annual fly-in.

Kenny Jordan, AESC Executive Director

While at lunch in the Senate cafeteria the day after the incident, my phone rang. It was a reporter for one of the largest news agencies in the U.S. He wanted our comments on the disaster and an answer to what the cause might have been. Having seen only what others had seen in the news, I couldn’t very well answer the question, as we were only about 16 hours into the blowout. I had no knowledge of the circumstances, and wouldn’t have commented anyway. But that doesn’t seem to stop some people or the press from jumping to conclusions, placing blame before the facts are known. And yet, we as a society and nation are programmed to believe that whatever is reported is fact. What we fail to realize is that the information being reported is an interpretation of events or facts — filtered through the writings or thoughts of those who are suppose to be giving us an unbiased reporting of facts.

Is the BP incident an environmental disaster? Without question! Is this something that BP intentionally did? No way! But yet the spin in the media continues to paint the entire industry as negligent — that we are nothing more than unregulated, uncaring rogues who would do anything in the name of producing another barrel of oil. It is this type of industry stereotyping, through the years, that has continuously posed issues for our industry. We are a much safer industry today than we were 20 years ago and continue to improve each year. But yet, we can’t seem to break the cycle of negative stereotyping by the politicians, the media and the general public in non-oil and gas producing areas. This type of stereotyping shut down an entire sector of offshore industry because of the BP incident. You don’t see this in other industries. Did all of the coal mines get shut down due to safety concerns when the disaster happened in West Virginia in April of this year? This incident took place only a couple of weeks before the Gulf of Mexico explosion.

The point is that we as an industry have always been treated differently than other industries — and always will be. It is up to us to continue doing the right things in terms of being safe, environmentally-friendly companies. Regardless, at the end of the day no matter what we do, we are judged by John Q. Public’s interpretation of what the media is feeding them.