COVINGTON, La. - BP said Wednesday it had begun injecting mud into the blownout well in the hopes of stopping the Gulf oil disaster.

The oil giant said the operation started at 2 p.m. ET.

According Joe Macaluso of The Advocate: The Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries announced at 8 p.m. Saturday the most far-reaching closure of state coastal waters in the more than four weeks since British Petroleum’s Deepwater Horizon rig began gushing oil into the Gulf of Mexico off Louisiana’s coast.

All the newly closed waters are “inside” waters and include closures of most of Barataria Bay, all of Caminada Bay north of Grand Isle, and most, if not all, of Terrebonne and Timbalier bays.

According to the Associated Press, eighty-one-year-old Don Minnaert fell fifteen feet into the frigid waters of Hennepin Canal when he refused to cut his line against a monster bass.

Minnaert was actually targeting panfish last May 13 in his native Geneseo, Illinois when he tumbled into the canal.  He had just hooked a small fish with his ultra light rig when a bass took his catch and plowed for deeper waters.

The U.S. Coast Guard has reported that tar balls likely from the explosion of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig have begun to show up near Key West, Florida. Further, nearly 46,000 square miles of federal waters have been closed to fishing.

It is likely that oil from the Deepwater Horizon spill has very likely already entered the Gulf of Mexico’s Loop Current, according to National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Administrator Jane Lubchenco.

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