Oil Spill’s Emotional Toll Leads to Apparent Suicide

Allen “Rookie” Kruse, a char­ter fish­ing boat cap­tain for over twenty years, went to work for BP two weeks ago to help clean­ing up the oil spill that has put him and so many oth­ers out of work.  Sadly, this hard-working man apprently com­mit­ted sui­cide on Wednes­day while out on his boat working.

On Wednes­day morn­ing, Kruse drove to his boat as usual. As the deck­hands pre­pared for the day’s work, Kruse, as the cap­tain, was sup­posed to turn on the gen­er­a­tor. But after a few min­utes, the crew mem­bers said, they didn’t hear any­thing and went look­ing for him. A deck­hand found him in the wheel­house, shot in the head.

Today is day 65 of the tragic oil spill.  Right now it seems there is no end in sight to the end­less geyser spew­ing from the bot­tom of the gulf.  An ever-increasing feel­ing of help­less­ness effects every­one in this area — espe­cially those whose liveli­hoods are derived directly from the water, like Allen Kruse.  Numer­ous faith-based groups are deploy­ing chap­lains to areas around the Gulf Coast to help with the pyscho­log­i­cal toll.

Please pray for every­one down here.  The sit­u­a­tion just keeps dete­ri­o­rat­ing, and with no end in sight to the oil gusher I fear we may see more cases like this.  It’s sad and  heart­break­ing that some folks feel they have no other choice but sui­cide.  That is not the case.  There are fam­ily, friends, neigh­bors, and even strangers that will help oth­ers get through this mess.

Related Posts:

• Oil Spill Will Cost MS Coast $120 Mil­lion This Summer
• Obama’s First Oval Office Speech: We need cap and tax!
• Oil Spill Update: Oil Slick Enters Mis­sis­sippi Sound
• The Gulf Oil Spill — A Photo Post