In November 2011, BP fired an employee named August Walter, who had been working on clean-up of the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill. Now, Wilson says the company fired him because he wouldn’t help gloss over its clean-up shortcuts. He’s suing BP in federal court.
BP and the Coast Guard are working on the clean-up together, and there’s a plan they’re supposed to follow. Walter says BP was not following the plan correctly and also hadn’t made enough progress to meet scheduled deadlines. He says that he pointed this out, tried to ensure the clean-up followed the proper plan, and would not change numbers to make it seem like BP had made more progress than it had — and the company responded to his efforts by first putting him on leave, then firing him.
Walter also says BP’s VP of operations told him he needed to make it seem like the clean-up was going according to plan in order to keep BP stock prices up.
Of course, that’s just Walter’s side of the story! And since multinational oil giants never cut corners in pursuit of profits, surely there must be another explanation for his firing. We’re waiting with bated breath for BP’s explanation.
