Oil spill endangers fragile marshland-Clean-up efforts begin after oil explosion in the Gulf of Mexi

[OKIsItJustMe]

http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100427/full/news.2010.206.html

Published online 27 April 2010 | Nature | doi:10.1038/news.2010.206

Oil spill endangers fragile marshland

Clean-up efforts begin after oil explosion in the Gulf of Mexico.

Mark Schrope

As oil continues to spew from the oil rig that went up in flames in the Gulf of Mexico last week, the probability of major environmental damage increases. For now, frantic clean-up efforts and favorable winds are preventing 18 square kilometres of thick oil slick and thousands more square kilometres of oily sheen from reaching the shore.

About 160,000 litres of oil per day are gushing from two holes in the pipe that once connected the 1.5-kilometre-deep well to the Deepwater Horizon rig at the surface. How long the spill continues depends on which of several emergency efforts under way is successful.

The most threatening portion of the spill is a black oil slick that runs east and west from the accident site and comes within 65 kilometres of marshy coast near Venice, Louisiana. If the wind switches from its current offshore direction the slick could be driven into the marshland wreaking environmental havoc.

"Those marshes are very, very sensitive areas", says Nancy Kinner, an environmental engineer and co-director of the Coastal Response Research Center at the University of New Hampshire in Durham. The marshes serve as nurseries for countless economically and ecologically important fish and crustaceans whose young might be smothered or otherwise harmed, she says.

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[Dogmudgeon]

1. Let me be the first to Kick and Rec

As of last report, this is on track to become the worst oil spill in history.

--d!

[Nihil]

2. K & R ... one more needed please ...

Too many people have already written this event off as "just another
oil industry accident" and have gone back to their twittered reports
of the wannabe celebrity de jour ...
:-(

[Dead_Parrot]

3. Sat image:

Edit: How the hell did this go back to 0 recs? :wtf:

[OKIsItJustMe]

4. Re: How the hell did this go back to 0 recs?

I'm guessing it was all an unfortunate accident.

[joshcryer]

5. It's not even letting me rec, and it's not been 24 hours. It may be a bug?

If not I would be appalled to know that some posters here UNREC'd this post. I'm going to delude myself it's a bug.

[Nihil]

8. Nah ... just the usual trolls ...

... they noticed who asked for the 5th rec to get it more visible ...
:eyes:

[joshcryer]

9. FIVE THOUSAND BPD.

[joshcryer]

6. Holy crap, that's huge. And it's going to keep leaking for weeks if not months.

[NNadir]

7. I wonder where all of our anti-nukes are on this one. Calling for oil bans are they?

Including their pals in Denmark?

The silence is predicably deafening.

I've been bitching for years about oil wars, oil terrorism, oil waste, oil accident and oil depletion, but often get distracted from it by dumb people with no science educations who want to insist that both Kiev and Harrisburg PA were wiped out by nuclear energy.

Here's one example of my whining on a website where I used to write:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/11/10/183223/55">What Would Have Happened If The Dangerous Fossil Fuel Accident in S.F. Bay Involved DME, Not Oil?