Talk:Kuwaiti oil fires

message: "During Operation Desert Storm in 1991, Dr. S. Fred Singer debated Carl Sagan on the impact of the Kuwaiti petroleum fires on the ABC News program Nightline. Sagan said the smoke would loft into the upper atmosphere, disrupt the monsoons and lead to ecological disaster. Singer said such a view was ridiculous, that the smoke would go up only a few thousand feet and then be washed out of the atmosphere by rain. Three days later, black rain began falling over Iran, which essentially put an end to the speculation."  this seems not important enough to be in the introductory paragraph.  The speculation of two scientists about what they thought would happen and then did does not seem very notable.  In addition, I do not know what it means because of the way it was worded.  It just says what to viewpoints are, then says what happened as a result, then said it ended speculation. However how did that result end the speculation, and whose theory is correct.  it is to amniguous for me to be able to decipher it at all.  It almots seems as if someone included this just to make a point about one of the scientists.Scotto263 01:58, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Nightline Debate

message: The Peak Oil article mentions that approximately 1.5 Gb burned away before all fires were extinguished. That number is absent from this article (only an estimated daily loss is given). Perhaps this number (and an estimated economic loss) should be included in this article as well?  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.191.62.33 (talk) 20:50, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Accumulated loss 

message: In the introduction, it is mentioned that around 5 million barrels of oil were burnt a day.  In the environmental impact section, its mentioned that 6 million barrels of oil were burnt a day.  Which is more accurate? (Namzie11 (talk) 04:14, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Of the sources in the article, this is the only one that seems to give a specific estimate (of 6 million barrels per day). So, I have changed the figure in the introduction. Thanks, Black Falcon (Talk) 16:23, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Contradictory data 

message: I remember back in the early 90s (1991 or 1992, I can't remember), it hailed in the small city of Al-Jubail, Saudi Arabia where I lived. It had never happened before and everybody was shocked. People even went out, collected the hail and put it inside their freezers! There were car accidents and at least a few electric poles fell over. The hail was of fairly small size so hail-related damage was limited. The electric poles were probably not designed for cold weather. In retrospect, the temperature was not sub-freezing but it was definitely below 7*C. This is shocking in itself in a place where it rarely rains and temperatures often soar to 50*C. 
I believe this unprecedented and peculiar weather was caused by the fires in Kuwait. I don't have any sources, so that's why I'm simply writing my own personal first-hand experience here.
--Zybez (talk) 19:18, 6 November 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Hail and cold weather caused by smoke 

message: It appears that newly released documents may necessitate updating this section:
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/20/world/middleeast/20archive.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1
Someone more proficient can dig deeper, but from this article:
:"Mr. Gorbachev’s diplomatic efforts were undermined on Feb. 22 when the Kuwaiti oil well fires that Mr. Hussein had ordered set — and which he saw as a defensive measure — were described by Mr. Bush in his conversation with the Soviet leader as a “scorched-earth policy” and a reason to not delay military action."  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.45.144.150 (talk) 01:30, 21 January 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Motives 

message: The article contradicts itself. 
It states
" The fires started in January and February 1991 and the last one was extinguished by November 1991.[1]
But also :
"Two wells have yet to be sucessfully extinguished."
One would presume that after 20 years, the fires are out, but I cannot find any data either way...  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.120.222.100 (talk) 14:55, 25 March 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Still not sourced almost a year later. Removed. -- DevSolar (talk) 14:45, 24 January 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Still burning? 

message: Before the war, Iraq threatened to start the oil wells on fire, and it was claimed that it would take many years to put out the fires.  That did not come true.  It would be good to survey how the technology of putting out these fires changed if at all during operations.  Did the best practices change?  Did the average amount of time for completing a job change?  Did the number of crews in operation change?  What was the typical cost for capping a well after---compared to the cost before---the fires were started?  Did Iraq have to pay reparations for the lost oil and the environmental damage?  Was there a timely and efficient response to the problem?  What were some of the details of the economic incentives for the companies doing the work?  Were the existing companies given incentive to train new teams both inside and outside their companies?CountMacula (talk) 13:39, 1 October 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Overview of the economics and changes in technology for extinguishing oil well fires, etc. 

message: I'm generally happy with the article as it stands now, I've tagged a few things needing references that I wasn't able to find and also tagged one statement needing clarification.
The paragraph tagged for clarification is this-
"At the peak of the fires, the smoke absorbed 75 to 80% of the sun’s radiation.  The particles rose to a maximum of , but were scavenged from the atmosphere relatively quickly.
My rationale for the tagging is that, from my understanding, soot isn't "scavenged"/(chemically attacked by atmospheric molecules) very quickly and is but a minor pathway for the removal of soot from the air, regardless of if it's from Diesel trucks or the 1991 Kuwaiti oil fires, from my atmospheric science modules in college I came to the understanding that soot and particulate matter in general is removed from the air most commonly by physically being rained out, as it acts like a cloud condensation nuclei, being removed by wet deposition and/or it falls out via dry deposition. Chemical Scavenging only removes a small percentage of it.
So although the reference is a good one, I'd like some clarification on why the author appears to suggest chemical scavenging lay behind the removal of the soot, and if chemical scavenging did lay behind the majority of the soot's removal, how did they determine this, were experiments conducted etc? 
I'd be interested in finding out.
31.200.144.195 (talk) 15:52, 9 June 2014 (UTC)
thread_title: An IP user's recent edits, requesting feedback

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message: Why is there so much information about what people (namely Carl Sagan) thought would happen?  I think a one or two line paragraph that said "some scientists, such as Carl Sagan, were concerned that the smoke would reach the stratosphere.  This prediction turned out to be incorrect." and then just stick to what the actual effects were. Flipster14191 (talk) 17:15, 13 January 2018 (UTC)
thread_title:  Environmental Impact Section 

message: The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion:
* F-14A VF-114 over burning Kuwaiti oil well 1991.JPEG
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