COASTA~2

Hello All,

I put together some photos that illustrate what we have been seeing during our surveys over the last eight weeks on the Gulf coast in terms of pre and post oil landfall impacts to beach-nesting birds, shorebirds and shorebird habitat. This can be considered part of the visual data that the CBC is collecting.

You may circulate this PDF to any appropriate parties.

Best,

Margo

Margo Zdravkovic
Director
Coastal Bird Conservation/Conservian
Conserving Coastal Birds and their Habitats throughout the Western Hemisphere.
Phone 561-504-4251

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/jun/30/biologists-find-oil-spill-
deadzones

Methane at 100,000 times normal levels have been creating oxygen-depleted
areas devoid of life near BP’s Deepwater Horizon spill, according to two
independent scientists

Suzanne Goldenberg, US environment correspondent
Thursday July 1 2010
The Guardian

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/jun/30/biologists-find-oil-spill-
deadzones

Scientists are confronting growing evidence that BP’s ruptured well in the
Gulf of Mexico is creating oxygen-depleted “dead zones” where fish and other
marine life cannot survive.

In two separate research voyages, independent scientists have detected what
were described as “astonishingly high” levels of methane, or natural gas,
bubbling from the well site
[http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/may/08/deepwater-horizon-blast-m
ethane-bubble” title=””>”astonishingly high], setting off a chain of
reactions that suck the oxygen out of the water. In some cases, methane
concentrations are 100,000 times normal levels.

Other scientists as well as sport fishermen are reporting unusual movements
of fish, shrimp, crab and other marine life, including increased shark
sightings closer to the Alabama coast.

Larry Crowder, a marine biologist at Duke University, said there were
already signs that fish were being driven from their habitat.

“The animals are already voting with their fins to get away from where the
oil spill is and where potentially there is oxygen depletion,” he said.
“When you begin to see animals changing their distribution that is telling
you about the quality of water further offshore. Basically, the fish are
moving closer to shore to try to get to better water.”

Such sightings ? and an accumulation of data from the site of the ruptured
well and from the ocean depths miles away ? have deepened concerns that the
enormity of the environmental disaster in the Gulf has yet to be fully
understood. It could also jeopardise the Gulf’s billion-dollar fishing and
shrimping industry.

In a conference call with reporters, Samantha Joye, a scientist at the
University of Georgia who has been studying the effects of the spill at
depth, said the ruptured well was producing up to 50% as much methane and
other gases as oil.

The finding presents a new challenge to scientists who so far have been
focused on studying the effects on the Gulf of crude oil, and the 5.7m
litres of chemical dispersants used to break up the slick.

Joye said her preliminary findings suggested the high volume of methane
coming out of the well could upset the ocean food chain. Such high
concentrations, it is feared, would trigger the growth of microbes, which
break up the methane, but also gobble up oxygen needed by marine life to
survive, driving out other living things.

Joye said the methane was settling in a 200-metre layer of the water column,
between depths of 1,000 to 1,300 metres in concentrations that were already
threatening oxygen levels.

“That water can go completely anoxic [extremely low oxygen] and that is a
pretty serious situation for any oxygen-requiring organism. We haven’t seen
zero-oxygen water but there is certainly enough gas in the water to draw
oxygen down to zero,” she said.

“It could wreak havoc with those communities that require oxygen,” Joye
said, wiping out plankton and other organisms at the bottom of the food
chain.

A Texas A&M University oceanographer issued a similar warning last week
on his return from a 10-day research voyage in the Gulf. John Kessler
recorded “astonishingly high” methane levels in surface and deep water
within a five-mile radius of the ruptured well. His team also recorded 30%
depletion of oxygen in some locations.

Even without the gusher, the Gulf was afflicted by 6,000 to 7,000 square
miles of dead zone at the mouth of the Mississippi river, caused by run-off
from animal waste and farm fertiliser.

The run-off sets off a chain reaction. Algae bloom and quickly die, and are
eaten up by microbes that also consume oxygen needed by marine life.

But the huge quantities of methane, or natural gas, being released from the
well in addition to crude presents an entirely new danger to marine life and
to the Gulf’s lucrative fishing and shrimping industry.

“Things are changing, and what impacts there are on the food web are not
going to be clear until we go out and measure that,” said Joye.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6603TK20100701

Thu Jul 1, 2010 2:47pm EDT

Louisiana (Reuters) – A massive ship converted into a “super skimmer” has arrived in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico to assist with cleanup of the BP oil spill, a government spokeswoman said Thursday.

The 1,100-foot (335 meter)-long ore and oil carrier, dubbed the “A Whale,” is being provided by the owner, TMT Shipping of Taiwan, and can collect 500,000 barrels (21 million gallons) per day of contaminated water, said Chris Coulon, a spokeswoman for the joint incident command.

Financial arrangements of the deal to provide the ship were not immediately available. Coulon said it had not been contracted but added that BP Plc might begin formal contract negotiations if the ship proved to be useful.

The gray and rust-colored tanker, which has a large blue whale painted on its funnel, was converted in mid-June in Portugal to skim spilled oil from the sea but needs to be evaluated by the Coast Guard and others for use in the Gulf.

It rested at anchor in the Mississippi River north of Venice, Louisiana on Thursday. Three horizontal slits used to skim oil were visible at water level on the tanker’s port side.

The ship has been described as a “super skimmer” because it can scoop up millions of gallons of oily water mix every day, much more than skimming vessels already in use.

Rough seas and winds caused by Hurricane Alex, which went ashore in northeastern Mexico late Wednesday, were delaying plans to test the new skimmer.

“They can’t do their testing until the weather has died down,” Coulon said. “They are in close contact with ship owners to proceed with testing as soon as the weather permits.”

At a White House briefing on Thursday, Retired Coast Guard Admiral Thad Allen, the government’s point man for the spill response, said he had “high hopes” for the new skimmer.

About 500 skimmers were in operation prior to the halt of skimming operations as Alex threatened. At the peak, 650 such vessels were in operation.

More than 28 million gallons of oily water mix have been picked up since the beginning of the spill about two and a half months ago, and the cleanup rate has picked up recently. The total a month ago was about 14 million gallons.

Oil from BP’s blown-out well began spewing into the waters off Louisiana after an oil rig exploded on April 20, killing 11 workers.

(Additional reporting by Bruce Nichols and Eileen O’Grady in Houston, editing by Anna Driver and Paul Simao)
Special thanks to Richard Charter

Houston Chronicle
July 2, 2010

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/business/deepwaterhorizon/7090804.html

Scientists using research tools in new ways to look for signs of oil spreading down below, but have turned up nothing
By HARVEY RICE
HOUSTON CHRONICLE
July 2, 2010, 12:37AM

ABOARD THE THOMAS JEFFERSON The 208-foot research vessel Thomas Jefferson slicing through swells off Florida’s Gulf Coast this week has been chasing an elusive ghost hatched from the BP well blowout: oil plumes.

The prospects of these monstrous plumes emerged as a frightening character in the Macando well narrative after limited data suggested that underwater plumes might be the size of some of the Great Lakes. But until BP’s well blew out April 20, no one had tried developing the technology for finding oil underwater.

For the last five weeks, scientists and the rest of Thomas Jefferson Cmdr. Shepard Smith’s crew have been working to develop such a method, using the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration vessel designed for mapping the ocean bottom in shallow water.

Scientists haven’t found a sure-fire method so far, but they are closer to doing so because of this group’s research.

They have found no monster plumes of oil extending dozens or hundreds of miles, as had been feared.

Smith said new data suggest the plumes may be a few miles across. He is reluctant to use the word “plume,” preferring “anomaly,” because scientists are still awaiting lab results to verify their conclusions.

“I’m not aware of a single sample that shows we found oil underwater,” acoustics specialist Lt. Sam Greenaway said.

Clues in the deep

In the commander’s office, Greenaway huddles alongside Smith at computer screens showing dark blue columns turning to purple as they descend toward the ocean depths near where BP’s Macando well is spewing oil.

The officers are looking for clues in sonar data gathered a week ago that will help them figure out how to find underwater oil. The Thomas Jefferson and other research ships are inventing techniques as they look for something they don’t even know how to describe.

“Is it in tiny droplets?” Greenaway wondered aloud. “Is it in large droplets? Is it emulsified? Is it there at all?”

The Thomas Jefferson was two weeks into a five-month mission to chart hazards to navigation along the Gulf Coast when the Macando well erupted. Worries about underwater plumes arose as the blowout continued to spew millions of gallons of oil into the Gulf.

To confront the disaster, the NOAA converted the Thomas Jefferson into a plume hunter.

NOAA upgraded the ship’s sonar and equipped it with a “fish,” a device towed behind the ship that can dive and look for a fluorescent light signature given off by oil.

Lt. Denise Gruccio, the executive officer, kept watch on the bridge Wednesday. She recalled that because the ship lacked computer steering assistance, it was difficult to keep it stationary for as long as two hours when the fish was cast deep. “It was nerve-wracking,” Gruccio said.

Never done before

The ship had borrowed a “rosette,” tubes clustered in a circle resembling a rose. Each tube in the rosette is set to sample water at a certain depth.

Although the crew knew how to operate each one of the devices, no one had ever used them in combination to find oil plumes, Smith said.

“We don’t normally do this type of work,” Smith said. “Nobody ever does this type of work because this deepwater blowout is an unprecedented challenge.”

During its first plume-hunting voyage, the Thomas Jefferson headed for the site of the blowout. But the ship was forced to stand off at a distance of five miles so that its sonar wouldn’t interfere with equipment being used in the effort to cap the well.

Weeks later, allowed within a half mile of the blowout, they found data suggesting a wake was forming behind the oil column as it spirals to the surface. Greenaway sat at a computer Wednesday and calculated the top of the column, a blue swath on the screen, as about 3,600 feet wide. A U-shaped bump on the screen indicated the possibility of a wake formed by currents pushing against the plume.

“This tells us where to find the oil,” Smith said, because any that broke off into plumes would be pushed in the direction of the wake.

Microbial mystery

He said the wake appeared to extend more than 3,000 feet from the bottom of the 5,000-foot column of oil.

The Thomas Jefferson also found data suggesting that microbes were eating the oil as it moved away from the blowout site. Smith said it appears that microbes are breaking down the oil, but it’s not clear what remains after they finish dining.

The ship also discovered that, rather than a river of oil, the plumes are more like clouds of oil droplets being pushed through the depths by currents.

harvey.rice@chron.com
Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://news.blogs.cnn.com/2010/07/02/dispersants-flow-into-gulf-in-science-experiment/

By Ed Lavandera, CNN – July 2, 2010 – http://tinyurl.com/2avhnyo

STORY HIGHLIGHTS
· Chemical dispersants keep flowing at virtually unchanged levels
· EPA directive says level should be cut by 75%
· CNN analysis shows flow down by 9% per day
· Dispersant use called “science experiment”

Chemical dispersants keep flowing into the Gulf of Mexico at virtually unchanged levels despite the Environmental Protection Agency’s order to BP to “significantly” scale back, according to a CNN analysis of daily dispersant reports provided by the Deepwater Horizon Unified Command.

When the May 26 directive was issued, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson said dispersant use should be cut by 75%.

Public statements at the time made by the EPA administrator gave the impression that federal officials were trying to cut down overall dispersant use.

“We expect to see a substantial reduction in the overall amount of dispersant used,” Jackson said in May.

Before May 26, BP used 25,689 gallons a day of the chemical dispersant Corexit. Since then, CNN’s analysis shows, the daily average of dispersant use has dropped to 23,250 gallons a day, a 9% decline.

Gulf Coast environmentalists say it’s another sign that the federal agencies monitoring dispersant use are not being tough enough with BP.

“I think the EPA has been struggling to respond to this crisis,” said Aaron Viles with the Gulf Restoration Network. “It’s all really a giant science experiment and we’re terribly concerned that in the long run the impacts are going to be significant and we really don’t know what we’re doing to the ecosystem.”

But the EPA argues it deserves credit for getting alarming dispersant use under control. The directive states that BP must ramp down dispersant use by “75% from the maximum daily amount used.”

And that’s the catch. The highest recorded amount of dispersant used occurred on May 23, when 70,000 gallons were injected into the Gulf of Mexico. EPA officials say they feared that number would have become the norm and that’s why, they say, the directive was issued.

“This escalation was quickly reversed, ensuring BP only uses the lowest volume of dispersant needed,” said Adora Andy, a spokeswoman for the EPA.

But even by the EPA’s own standards, BP still routinely exceeds the daily threshold. The EPA and Coast Guard say they’re trying to keep dispersant use to around 18,000 barrels a day.

But according to CNN’s analysis, BP has gone over that amount 50 percent of the time since the May 26 directive was issued. To do so, BP must request permission from the U.S. Coast Guard.

Coast Guard officials say dispersant use is “evaluated daily” and that it’s using the “safest and most effective methods available” to protect the sea environment.

“The EPA-Coast Guard directive has been successful in ensuring that BP uses the lowest volume of dispersant necessary,” U.S. Coast Guard Lt. Erik Halvorson, a spokesman with the Unified Area Command.

The EPA continues testing the chemical dispersant Corexit 9500, which has been used by BP since the beginning of the oil disaster. So far more than 1.6 million gallons of the chemical have been injected into the Gulf of Mexico.

But the struggle over daily dispersant use has caught the eye of Rep. Ed Markey, D-Massachusetts, one of the loudest critics of BP’s response in cleaning up the oil spill.

“I think it is obvious we can never again allow for a repetition of what is happening right now, where the science experiment is being conducted without having any idea what the impact on marine life long term will be,” said Markey.

Special thanks to Ashley Hotz.