According to government officials, the blown-out BP well 40 miles off the Louisiana coast is pumping five times as much oil into the water as the 5,000 barrels originally estimated, or 200,000 gallons a day -- and there's no way to stop it.
At that rate, the Gulf spill could be bigger than the Exxon Valdez, the worst spill in U.S. history, which dumped 11 million gallons of oil into Alaska's Prince William Sound in 1989.
Because wells in the Gulf of Mexico tap oil deposits that hold many times more than a single tanker, the BP spill could ultimately be far worse than Exxon Valdez. It will take 3 months to drill a relief well to stop the gusher 5,000 feet down on the sea floor.
The oil slick has already reached the Mississippi River delta, threatening hundreds of species of fish, birds and other wildlife along the Gulf Coast, one of the world's richest seafood grounds.
David Kennedy, of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, told the AP that the scope of the disaster was "mind boggling".
Because the volume of the spill is much bigger than first reported, many in Louisiana see echoes of the bungled response to Hurricane Katrina.
People whose livelihoods are threatened by the spill don't know whether to blame BP, the federal government, or the Coast Guard for what they see as a cover-up of the scope of the disaster.
Families that have fished the Gulf waters for generations see their businesses at an end. Some have already filed lawsuits against BP.
Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal has declared a state of emergency. There are at least 10 wildlife management areas and refuges in his state and neighboring Mississippi in the path of the spill. Jindal has called for 6,000 National Guardsmen.
President Barack Obama has dispatched Cabinet officials to deal with the crisis.
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