Oil Spill

On April 20, 2010 - two weeks ago, a BP oil rig, the Deep Horizon just off of the coast of Louisiana exploded resulting in the death of 11 crew members and setting events in motion that would lead to one of the most catastrophic oil spills in history. An estimated 210,000 gallons of crude oil are being leaked into the ocean every day- meaning that over a million gallons of oil could already have contaminated the ocean. And despite many efforts to contain the spill and clean it up as quickly as possible- it is proving to be a very difficult task. Obama was reported calling the spill a "potentially unprecedented environmental disaster,"on Sunday- comparing it to the likes of the EXXON spill of 89 which spilled nearly 11 million gallons of crude oil, contaminating over 1,300 miles of Alaskan coastline, and 11,000 square miles of ocean.

The New York Times reported on Saturday, "The imperiled marshes that buffer New Orleans and the rest of the state from the worst storm surges are facing a sea of sweet crude oil, orange as rust."The marshes that have already been degraded by recent hurricanes such as Katrina and Rita are already in critical condition, and skeptics wonder how much more they can take. Scientists are unsure of how the marshes and wetlands will handle the impending influx of oil. Normally, wetlands can survive spills of this nature, but already weakened by hurricanes it is possible that much of the grasses that make up the wetland ecosystem could die out. 

Obviously, this is already a huge environmental problem, and it is only going to continue to grow until the rig can be shut down. The reason this task has proved so difficult thus far is because the rig is 5,000 feet below the surface of the ocean. And for some reason, despite numerous efforts by BPs engineers- the rig's blowout preventers are not closing. Since then, the National Guard has tried burning off the oil before it can spread but weather is preventing as much action as they would have hoped. In addition, engineers were able to send down robots to fix one of three leaks on the boat but the oil flow has not slowed down. The next step in trying to contain the spill is, according to the New York Times, to lower a 98-ton "containment dome" over the rig in order to prevent further contamination.

President Obama, who has been endorsing off shore drilling took a big hit with this catastrophic event. He has shut down all new off-shore oil rigs until this situation can be resolved and is taking some heat from his previous critics, and environmentalists alike to postpone offshore drilling altogether until more safeguards can be put into place in order to combat these sorts of situations.

Sources: [NYTimes: Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill (2010). NYTimes: Gulf Coast Towns Brace as Huge Oil Slick Nears Marshes.Wikipedia: EXXON . ]

-  Amber