Afull accounting

摘要

On 14 June, BP promised to put USS20 billion into an escrow account to pay for damage caused by the 22 April sinking of its Deepwater Horizon drilling platform off the coast of Louisiana - an event that has left a geyser of crude oil gushing into the Gulf of Mexico for two months, at a rate currently estimated as high as 60,000 barrels (9.5 million litres) a day. The beneficiaries of this fund are expected to be fishermen, hoteliers, charter-boat operators and other Gulf-coast business owners who have lost income, as well as states and other entities with clean-up costs.