The Oil Song by Steve Forbert
The Oil Song by Steve Forbert
Oozing crude, the gooey and dangerous sludge
Hi all,
Thank you for joining me for this week’s song,”The Oil Song”, by Steve Forbert (1994). If you’d like to hear the song before you read the background, I’ve included a YouTube video below the article.
✳️ Note: The level of this article is for students with a TOEIC of 550+, Eiken Pre-1, CEFR B2. For Japanese students, vocabulary words in bold are provided in Japanese below.
(771 words)
Today’s song is about several oil spills that have caused environmental disasters.
The first two mentioned were accidents that occurred in December, 1976, near Nantucket Island in the state of Delaware.
A ship called the Olympic Games was carrying oil. On Dec. 28, it went aground (got stuck on land) and started leaking oil. The newspapers penned (wrote) that it was “The Big Spill”, maybe one that people living there had been afraid would happen.
“Oh, the engine’s gone dead,” cried the men who were there
And she passed up the dock on the wide Delaware (River)
Then the ship ran aground and the oil got away
And they penned that report, “The Big Spill” on that day
.
And it’s oil, oil
Drifting to the sea
Oil, oil
Don’t buy it at the station, you can have it now for free
Just come on down to the shoreline where the water used to be
.
It was hundreds of thousands of gallons galore
Stretching thirty-two miles (51.5 kms) down the Delaware shore
There were geese in the marshes out looking for food
They got stuck where they stood in the oncoming crude
“Crude” is oil in its original form before it has been changed into gasoline or other products such as plastics.
The second disaster mentioned was when the Argo Merchant broke up on Dec. 15. Later investigations showed that there was one worker, a helmsman, who was not qualified, there were problems with the ship’s compass, the ship was old, and they were using old maps of the area. On top of that, the weather was extremely bad and the sea was violent.
In the well-charted waters of the Nantucket shoals
Was a ship run aground full of oil, we were told
In a week’s worth of rough winter weather and waves
The boat started cracking and it could not be saved
The ship leaked 28 million liters of oil, creating an oil slick (a layer of oil that floats on top of the water) that covered over 160 kilometers.
It was seven-point-six million gallons this time
Consider the danger and think of the crime
As it poured out a slick stretching into the tide
For over one hundred miles and yes, it came deep, it came wide
.
There’s talk of some writing found in the ship’s log
Saying one of the helmsmen’s unfit for his job
And the ship’s gyrocompass was six degrees shy (less than/just short of)
Their charts were outdated, they tried to get by
How were these ships allowed to transport oil?
Different countries have different regulations for shipping. Some countries make it difficult to get a ship registered to carry oil. In Liberia, it is much easier, and that is where these two ships were registered.
Both of these ships, like a great many more
Got registered in through Liberian doors
Inspections are quick, regulations are few
Just sign on the line and go find you a crew
One of these ships was the Olympic Games
The Argo Merchant was the other one’s name
If things don’t get better, well, but they’ll probably get worse
If you can't drink the oil, oh, you might die of thirst
Creeping in the sea
The next two verses are not in the video.
On 16 March, 1978, a ship called the Amoco Cadiz was traveling between England and France. It went aground on the northwest coast of France, spilling the largest amount of oil up to that point in history.
Amoco Cadiz, between England and France
The big super tanker out there taking it's chance
With its one-hundred-thousand black tons of the slime
Amoco Cadiz spilled the most of all time
Well, not quite. An explosion on a British Petroleum drilling rig in the Gulf of Mexico caused the spread of oil. From Apr 20, 2010 – Sep 19, 2010, 134 million gallons (over 500 million liters) of oil was released, the most in history.
So, Steve Forbert added another verse:
Now down in the Gulf east of Mexico Way
There's something gone wrong, so the papers all say
A Mexican oil well is leaking it's goo (something thick and sticky)
They say it's the worse that things have ever come to
Yes it's gallons of sludge, sixty-million and more
It's cruising and oozing towards many a shore
Yes, things have got bad but they will probably get worse
If you can't drink the oil, oh, you might, you might die of thirst
Damaged ships and oil rigs are not the only causes of oil spills. During Hurricane Katrina in 2005, nine separate oil spills occurred in Louisiana.
Questions/Word usage
There are may ways to describe oil in its natural (crude) state: goo, sludge, Can you find another word in the song to describe it? (The answer is at the bottom)
In the fifth verse, the are the words get by. In this song, it has two meanings, 1) to manage to do something if you don’t have enough tools to do it, and 2) to physically move past something that is stationary.
1) I don’t have enough money to get by this month, so I don’t think I can go bowling with you.
2) Would you please move your backpack that’s here on the floor so that I can get by?
In what other situations would you use the verb get by?
VOCABULARY
spill 流出
get stuck 動けなくなる
leak 漏る
drift 漂流する
shoreline 海岸
galore しこたまま
geese ガチョウ (singular: goose)
marsh 沼沢
helmsman 操舵手
be qualified 資格を得る
pour 注ぐ
be shy of わずかに届かなかった
regulation 規制
registered 登録済み
inspection 検査
creep 忍び寄る
goo 粘着性またはぬるぬるした物質
drilling rig 掘削機
sludge 汚泥
cruise 航行する
ooze にじみ出る
SOURCES
Amoco Cadiz oil spill: The largest loss of Marine Life ever. (2022, March 14). Safety4Sea. https://safety4sea.com/cm-amoco-cadiz-oil-spill-the-largest-loss-of-marine-life-ever/. Accessed 23 Feb 2024.
Janson, D. (1976, December 29). 25‐Mile oil slick on the Delaware endangers wintering waterfowl. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/1976/12/29/archives/new-jersey-pages-25mile-oil-slick-on-the-delaware-endangers.html. Accessed 23 Feb 2024.
Winslow, R. (1978, January 1). Hard aground: The story of the argo merchant oil spill. Hard aground: the story of the Argo Merchant oil spill (Book) | OSTI.GOV. https://www.osti.gov/biblio/6457760. Accessed 23 Feb 2024.
Answer: slime
