BOOMDOGGLE? Coast Guard says East Pass boom requires a redo (PHOTOS)

Okaloosa County’s booming contractors must relocate the booms they’ve placed inside the Destin Pass due to what is being attributed to a breakdown in communication between Coast Guard officials at the state and local levels.

Or, perhaps, a breakdown in communication between Florida’s Emergency Operation Center in Florida and the unified command center in Mobile.

Whatever happened and wherever it happened, county officials were quick to say that problems have now been resolved, and though the Destin Pass isn’t presently completely armored against oil spill residue, Okaloosa County Public Safety Director Dino Villani said a new booming plan could be implemented as quickly as today.

“If we needed to, and we won’t, we could get it out there quickly,” Villani said. “It’s all there. On the weird chance something came in we can stretch boom in the morning.”

To see Tuesday's photos from ground zero, click here.

To watch a video of boom being strung in the water, click here.

To see photos of crews stringing boom Friday in East Pass, click here.

To see photos of crews deploying boom on Norriego Point Thursday, click here.

To watch a video of the boom being placed on Norriego Point, click here.

Click here to read the Local Action Plan showing the configuration for the placement of the booms for East Pass. 

For some reason, a copy of the county’s action plan, which outlined its Destin Pass booming plan in great detail, never found its way into the hands of leadership at the U.S. Coast Guard station in Destin, according to Destin City Manager Greg Kisela.

So when the county’s “tier 3” booming plan was implemented Sunday, the Coast Guard was surprised by rope tied to navigational buoys and boom extending into what they call their “navigable channel.”

That didn’t sit well with the Coast Guard.

Kisela said the local Coast Guard officials came to the county, saying, “we don’t know anything about this” booming strategy.

And that surprised county officials, whose action plan had long since been approved by the state.

“To say the least, it’s frustrating,” Kisela said.

Kisela explained the confusion as “a breakdown between the Coast Guard representatives in the unified command (operating out of Mobile) and the local Coast Guard people.”

But Okaloosa County Public Safety Director Dino Villani said the breakdown actually occurred between the state Emergency Operation Center and the Mobile command.

He said for some reason the state Emergency Operation Center and the unified command in Mobile had never discussed the specifics of the Destin Pass action plan.

T.J. Del Bello, the Coast Guard liaison to the Okaloosa County Deepwater Horizon Task Force, said that he has been out of town and that Tim Hudson, the master chief at the Destin station, had been standing in for him.

Hudson was unavailable Monday and a seaman answering the phone at the station said “we can’t give out any information.”

The seaman referred questions first to the joint unified command, then to Villani’s office.

Okaloosa County’s booming plan, separate from booming strategies devised and being implemented locally by BP and the state Department of Environmental Protection, is called a “chevron booming strategy.”

Designed through experimentation on swift-moving rivers, the boom system was devised to keep oil off sensitive areas and capture it at points where it can be collected for disposal.

When the contractors put out the boom Sunday, they used navigational buoys in the pass to tie down the booms, Villani said.

Additionally, according to Kisela, the booming itself extended into the navigational channel.

The issues between the Coast Guard and the county were ironed out through a couple of hastily called meetings, including one Monday morning that was attended by Coast Guard officers attached to the joint command center, Villani said.

Even so, Villani said, the changes require that a new plan for the booms be passed up the chain of command and that a new permit be issued by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

“Unfortunately, we have to roll up our sleeves again and go through this process of review and approval,” Villani said.

In a “best case scenario,” Villani said, the booming issues can be resolved today and the county contractors can redeploy the booms.

"It has been an interesting time navigating through the bureaucracy,” Kisela told the Destin City Council Monday.