BP Lowers 'Top Hat' Over Oil Spill

They call it 'Top Hat'
By Kevin Spak,  Newser Staff
Posted May 12, 2010 6:46 AM CDT
BP Lowers 'Top Hat' Over Oil Spill
The Viking Poseidon lowers the top hat device at the site of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico off the coast of Louisiana Tuesday, May 11, 2010.   (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert, Pool)

BP is trying the “if at first you don't succeed” method of oil spill containment, lowering a second, smaller box over its still-gushing underwater leak. The first box the company tried failed on Saturday, when ice-like crystals formed, making it float, CNN explains. That device was a whopping four stories tall, but this new one, dubbed “top hat,” is just 5 feet tall and 4 feet wide.

BP is hoping that smaller size will allow it to keep more water out as it descends. We should know if it's worked by tomorrow, according to Interior Secretary Ken Salazar. If it hasn't, BP will probably resort to the “junk shot,” shooting actual trash at the leak at extremely high pressures. (More British Petroleum stories.)

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