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Old 16th Aug 2010, 19:10
  #1924 (permalink)  
Machinbird
 
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Bearfoil
Certainly the slick was analyzed as to origin. Must be some mistake that it wasn't covered in the report.
I'd bet against that. A jet fuel slick would not be obvious unless you sailed through it and smelled it. It was largely evaporated 48-60 hours after the fact since jet fuel is pretty volatile and the low viscosity would allow it to spread unconstrained. We only know about it now because it showed up on a satellite radar scan of the area.
If they could find it on another scan in the archives, it would really narrow down its point of origin.
The Drift Group obviously didn't know what to make of it since it didn't fit any of their models, but at least they stuck it in at the end of their report thinking it might be relevant. In retrospect, it was probably the most relevant piece of data they had.
The bulk of that jet fuel had to be on the surface somewhere, at least until it evaporated, and yes, you can bet driblets are still coming to the surface unless the tanks were completely shattered, but having lower viscosity than WWII bunker fuel, the "half life" of the fuel emission is going to be a lot less than the Arizona's.
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