At BP's Houston offices, hundreds of scientists are at work on the Gulf spill. They have an unlimited budget, an international team of the sharpest minds in modern engineering — and they have no time.
Lately, engineers have rehearsed the "top kill," which will pump drilling fluid, or a rubbery mixture dubbed the "junk shot," or both, into the well. They have made dry runs on a blowout preventer elsewhere in Houston. In the command center, they've been "killing it on paper," Linegar said, going step by step through the process, game-planning for every possible problem. The stakes are high: Poorly executed, the top kill could blow the top of the blowout preventer and dramatically increase the oil spill's volume.
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