I'm not going to flip out about this just on this report. There are thousands of these platforms in the gulf. If a couple hundred are out of commission, that is a small percentage. Plus, we are going to tap the reserve, so if we can refine it, we'll be fine.
Now if the LOOP or it's pipeline sustained serious damage, I'd freak out.
There are a total of 819 manned "active production" platforms in the GOM - not thousands.
Collectively they produce an average of 1.5 million barrels of oil each day.
Katrina (alone) knocked 60% of this production capacity off-line - some of it was just getting back on line when Rita hit.
It appears that Rita has done even more major damage to many of the 819 production facilities - perhaps even sinking a few.
Once official word gets out thru the US Minerals Management Service expect prices to spike.