The Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded on 20 April 2010, sank two days later, and now the oil spill from the uncapped valve on the sea floor is causing an environmental emergency, about to wash ashore on the fragile Louisiana coastline.

The minor planet Ceres has been mentioned a lot lately in relation to the environment because she is has been in conjunction with Pluto, and they do have a strong link in Roman mythology. Ceres struck a deal with Pluto to share her daughter Persephone. Lynn Hayes stressed this association in The astrology of the Horizon oil rig explosion, “The elevation of Ceres has brought about a new global awareness about the needs for environmental balance.  Perhaps this explosion (Pluto) will facilitate even greater awareness about our tenuous ecological balance (Ceres).”

Associating Ceres with the environment in nothing new in astrology, from the Wikipedia page, Planets in astrology, “Ceres, as the Goddess who has control over nature’s resources and cycles, may be known also in astrology as the planet of the Environment. Going back to mythology, an early environmental villain is the figure of Erysichthon, the tearer up of the earth, who cut down trees in a grove sacred to Ceres-Demeter, for which he was punished by the goddess with fearful hunger. In this sense Ceres became an emerging archetypal in the social response of becoming aware of the recent Climate Change, and is entering our collective consciousness as a need to take care of our natural and irreplaceable resources in the 21st Century.”

British Petroleum

Ceres is also very strong in the horosope of British Petrolium, the owner of this disaster. This company was founded on 14 April 1909 as the Anglo-Persian Oil Company. You can see in the chart that Ceres is tightly square the Sun. So the identity of this corporation faces tests and challenges regarding environmental issues, ranging from disasters such as this explosion and oil spill, to global warming and peak oil.

Ceres is also quincunx Pluto, a difficult relationship causing constant tension between the environment (Ceres) and mining (Pluto). Using precession correction of 85 minutes, these are the transits to the BP chart from the Deepwater Horizon explosion:

Solar Eclipse conjunct Ceres 09′, square Sun 18′, quincunx Pluto 27′
New Moon conjunct Sun 52′, square Ceres 43′, sextile Pluto 61′
Pluto trine Jupiter 02′
Neptune conjunct Chiron 48′
South Node conjunct Neptune 02′, square Saturn 04 ‘
Moon opposite Uranus 10’

The Solar Eclipse and New Moon aspected the Ceres configuration highlighting this as the major issue. Chiron is a deep wound, aspected by Neptune, which can represent oil and the ocean, but also deception and fraud. Now this gets interesting, as the BP chart has Saturn square Neptune, and transiting South Node was conjunct Neptune at the time of the explosion. The South Node can represent karmic debts from the past, and BP has a shady history.

Saturn square Neptune well describes the deceptions and fraud surrounding the origins of this company and Iran. Bribes to Winston Churchill and a CIA coup. It’s no wonder Iran is test firing rockets over the Persian Gulf. Transiting Pluto trining the BP Jupiter is interesting, this is a fortunate aspect relating to big bussiness and wealth. BP profits for the first quarter of 2010 rose 135% compared to a year ago, as announced in a press release just two days ago.

Explosion!

To add to what I mentioned about the role of Ceres conjunct Pluto, Pluto itself rules mining and deep underground. Deepwater Horizon had been working the Tiber oilfield, the deepest oil and gas well ever drilled. This is so very Plutonic, pushing the boundaries to the extreme, penetrating deeper than ever before. Pluto does demand payment for journeying to his underworld.

[This horoscope was updated 29 May 2010 as a new time for the incident has been reported: “Around 9:53 p.m. CDT on April 20” – cnbc.com. The coordinates are from geohack.

The event chart shows a Boomerang Yod aspect pattern. A Yod is formed when two planets quincunx another. Here it is the Sun and Neptune that quincunx Saturn. The Boomerang is formed when another planet is opposite the action point, in this case Uranus is at the reaction point. So the action point was Saturn, the structure of the oil rig. Quincunxs create a build-up of energy which needs constant adjustments to be released safely.

If the energy bottles up too much then something has to give. Neptune oil and the ocean creating tension with the rig. The Sun made this special configuration for only a few days, and the pressure created by this extra quincunx is what makes these Yods so intense. The buildup of energy looks for release at the reaction point and Uranus is unexpected events, and explosions.

The duration of this environmental catastrophe may be explained from the longer term transits. Even though the Sun set up this Yod in the short term, the slower moving planets; Saturn, Uranus and Neptune, will keep there current aspects within two degrees atleast until July 2010. Ceres moving retrograde now and away from Pluto may ease things in a few weeks but there are some seriously heavy duty transits ahead of us this year, and oil is still gushing uncontrolled from the sea floor. Jupiter getting closer to conjunction with Uranus could amplify the unpredictable nature of this event.

1. blog.beliefnet.com/astrologicalmusings/2010/04/the-astrology-of-the-horizon-o.html