You do realize the article you originally cited said that the methane being released was killing things in the ocean. It said nothing about those on land dying as a result of the methane being released.
You do realize that none of the articles you cited actually agree with your proposition that the methane will kill people.
The first article said methane is not toxic and not even dangerous unless it is in a concentrated enough space to displace the oxygen. Now just to put things in perspective, the earth's atmosphere contains:
Gas Volume
Nitrogen (N2) 780,840 ppmv (78.084%)
Oxygen (O2) 209,460 ppmv (20.946%)
Argon (Ar) 9,340 ppmv (0.9340%)
Carbon dioxide (CO2) 390 ppmv (0.0390%)
Neon (Ne) 18.18 ppmv (0.001818%)
Helium (He) 5.24 ppmv (0.000524%)
Methane (CH4) 1.79 ppmv (0.000179%)
Krypton (Kr) 1.14 ppmv (0.000114%)
Hydrogen (H2) 0.55 ppmv (0.000055%)
Nitrous oxide (N2O) 0.3 ppmv (0.00003%)
Carbon monoxide (CO) 0.1 ppmv (0.00001%)
Xenon (Xe) 0.09 ppmv (9 × 10−6%)
Ozone (O3) 0.0 to 0.07 ppmv (0% to 7 × 10−6%)
Nitrogen dioxide (NO2) 0.02 ppmv (2 × 10−6%)
Iodine (I) 0.01 ppmv (1 × 10−6%)
Ammonia (NH3) trace
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmosphere_of_Earth
The earth's atmosphere is soo much larger in volume than the grand canyon that it is ridiculous to even compare the volume of the two. Even considering that the methane released in the oil spill was under pressure (which means it would take up a larger volume at atmospheric pressure), there is no way that this could skew Methanes percentage to even 1%. (To do so would mean that the oil spill would have to release 5000 times more Methane than is currently in the whole atmosphere...)
The second article said methane was explosive/flammable if it ever got to 5%. There is no danger of this happening for the Earth's atmosphere.
The third article cited a specific case where methane ignited in a very closed mining space.
The fourth article said BP was going to burn off the captured oil.
EDIT: I did a little extra calculation for you.
Earth's atmosphere contains about 30,000,000 cubic kilometers of methane. The Grand canyon has a volume of about 12000 cubic kilometers. If that 12,000 cubic kilometers was all methane at a pressure of 1,000,000 times more than atmospheric then this would be 12,000,000,000 cubic kilometers of methane. 12,000,000,000 / 30,00,000 is only 400 times more Methane than is currently in the atmosphere. This is no where near the 5000 times we would need to even get 1% of the Earth's atmosphere to be Methane. (Of course I should note that there are other factors which I cannot take into account, such as the earths atmosphere not having a uniform pressure which may affect my calculation. The temperature differences of methane in the atmosphere and the methane is being released may also affect my calculation.)
Get it CROAK (jfrog)
John 14:16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counsellor to be with you for ever 17 The Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you.
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