Worst Case and the Deepwater Horizon Blowout: There Ought to Be a Law

There is a law . In fact, there are three laws that, jointly and severally, should have anticipated and provided measures to prevent and cope with the explosion of the drilling rig Deepwater Horizon . Instead, we have 11 deaths, 17 serious injuries, the release of an American record 2 .6 million gallons of oil,2 an equivalent record for chemical dispersants,3 months of Mutt ‘n’ Jeff responses, enormous corporate losses, and the ensuing pain of the Gulf Coast region . Regulatory programs under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA),4 the Outer Continental Shelf Leasing Act (OCSLA)5 and the Oil Pollution Act (OPA)6 each require the consideration of worstcase situations . The latter two go further in requiring plans to minimize such possibilities and to respond effectively to them when they occur . What could have gone so badly wrong?