Can't Take Our Eyes Off of Goo

Only the latest hiccup in the efforts to contain and cleanup the seemingly never-ending gush of crude oil now covering the surface of the Gulf of Mexico and many of its beaches, the removal and replacement of the containment cap on June 23 snapped eyeballs back to the live underwater video feeds of the BP oil spill saga. The containment cap was wrangling about 29,000 gallons of oil an hour since it's installation in early June 2010. It was one of the only efforts that seemed to be working at controlling the leak since the oil rig Deepwater Horizon exploded and sank April 20, killing 11 rig workers and sending a seemingly unstoppable plume of orange and black oil to the surface of water. After numerous failed attempts to stop the flow of oil from the well 5,000 feet below the surface--including robots, golf balls, giant domes, a "top kill," "top hats," and diamond saws--BP seemed to be capturing the "majority" of the leaking oil, until an underwater robot bumped into a vent on the cap on June 23. BP removed the cap for the remainder of the day until the repairs could be made. It was reinstalled later that evening. But in the meantime large orange plumes again gushed from the sea floor. Watching BP's many failed efforts hasn't been the only frustrating video to emerge from the crisis; here are some of the most fascinating and maddening video clips of the last months.