Ten years ago today, an explosion and fire ripped through Transocean’s Deepwater Horizon drilling rig, working under contract for BP in the Gulf of Mexico. Eleven men lost their lives and more than 3m barrels of oil leaked into the ocean.
Fewer people will mark the anniversary than might otherwise have done. In the cruel calculus of catastrophes, 11 fatalities barely register against more than 130,000 worldwide from coronavirus.
A deadly virus and an oil well explosion — the first a natural phenomenon, the second described by an official US investigation as an overarching “failure of management” — are different. But there are suggestive parallels in how people prepared and responded to both.
您已阅读15%（699字），剩余85%（4002字）包含更多重要信息，订阅以继续探索完整内容，并享受更多专属服务。