Gulf Floor Fouled by Bacterial Oil Feast

Patchy seafloor deposits are mix of microbial waste, oil and other remnants of clean-up effort

February 22, 2011 RSS Feed Print

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To understand the impacts of the BP spill on the health of Gulf ecosystems, she said at a press briefing at the AAAS meeting, “we believe there needs to be a lot more monitoring on an ongoing basis.” But her agency probably won’t be spearheading it. “One of our current challenges,” Lubchenco says, “is that there is no obvious source of funding for that ongoing monitoring.”

The federal government and state trustees can “hold the parties responsible for the [BP] spill fully accountable to restore, rehabilitate, replace or acquire the equivalent of natural resources and services injured by the oil spill,” Lubchenco notes. But the first step is identifying the harm, she says, which may depend on long-term monitoring of oil-hammered ecosystems.

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Tags:: oceans,; Gulf of Mexico,; oil,; environment,; biology

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I am almost beyond words for that last comment, that’s like comparing apples to watermelons. The Gulf Oil spill was quite possibly the worst environmental disasters in our nation’s history. They should be held responsible, it was not a sneak attack or an act of war it was pure stupidity and chasing the green and not the environmental kind. In 1912 President Theodore Roosevelt said
"There can be no greater issue than that of conservation in this country."
This holds as true today as it did then, I suppose you think the American People should fit the bill for BP's stupidity. I disagree; maybe we can get people to come to the gulf to shoot pictures of oiled waterfowl, only ten million of them depend on the gulf for wintering habitat or as a stopover. Or maybe they could photograph the oiled marsh in Louisiana I wonder how fast that will increase the erosion of the largest wetland complex in the lower 48, they were only losing a football fields worth of land every 38 minutes prior to the spill. I hope you don’t like shrimp or oysters either as the majority of these we Americans eat come from the gulf. That’s just a start, scientists don't even know what all of the impacts are going to be, and they may not for a decade. We are supposed to use our natural resources wisely, not leave a garbage dump for our children and grandchildren. I sometimes wonder why stupid people breed.

Conservative Hunter of OK 1:14AM February 24, 2011

Say, I just read that the USS Arizona is still leaking oil in Pearl Harbor - 70 years after the Japanese attack.... Let's get 'em for restoration reparations!
Then, of course, Micronesia could come after us for sinking 77 Japanese warships, oil tankers and freighters in Truk Lagoon in 1944 - many of which still leak oil, and God knows what else. But they turned that place into a world famous dive resort and adventure destination - not a Super Fund Site. I guess Micronesia's kind'a "Green" is the color of money.
We should be so smart...

R.L. Schaefer of CA 10:31PM February 22, 2011

Gulf Floor Fouled by Bacterial Oil Feast

Patchy seafloor deposits are mix of microbial waste, oil and other remnants of clean-up effort

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Gulf Floor Fouled by Bacterial Oil Feast

Patchy seafloor deposits are mix of microbial waste, oil and other remnants of clean-up effort

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