There's a more recent article rounding up all the "horror stories," can't find it, here's one from last fall:

A New Boom in Natural Gas Threatens Drinking Water | Environment | AlterNet

Later that day, without warning, her toilet erupted. Water shot out of it like Niagara Falls. About that time, she learned, powerful pump trucks at the nearby well site were sending pulses of water mixed with sand and chemicals thousands of feet down into solid shale to fracture it to increase the flow of gas. She and her husband now believe some of that fluid escaped under pressure much nearer the surface.

After the Harrises complained, the drilling company had the water tested but found no problem. Harris's next-door neighbor, John Sayers, had a lab test his well water. The lab found toluene, a chemical used in explosives, paint stripper and often in drilling fluids. Almost a year later, the Harris family well water, once clear and sweet, is murky and foul-smelling. Ms. Harris's husband, Stevan, trucks in about 1,500 gallons twice a week, at 15 cents a gallon.

"We're not using that [well] water for anything at all," Mr. Sayers says. "I was told not to drink, wash, or anything. Not even water my grass with it. "

Far far away from private wells there's been some research into extracting hydrates from tight sands in the GOM, in UNG reservoirs, thus trapped in place and incapable of clathrate gun events, at least in theory, or not; that was one of my first questions on page 10 of this thread: U.S. Gulf gas hydrate find most promising yet - DOE. The tests were in blocks south of the fields tapped by Thunder Horse. Bottlenecks to delivery would be an issue but if this could be tapped safely it might displace some of the onshore drilling frenzy, with its attendant environmental issues.

The size of this resource in suitable formations was another question I had, but haven't heard from our peakoil.com resident cornucopian.