Reviewing the worst man-made ecological disaster prior to Fukushima

Back to the present

(NaturalNews) The BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico occurred on April 20, 2010. It was more of a deep sea floor gusher gone uncapped and wild as theoffshore oil rig exploded and sank in the Macondo Prospect, a submarine oil field off the coast of Louisiana. The ocean floor was 5,000 feet down, and that's where the drillingSo the oil that was struck was even farther down. Some have now rejected the, which has never been proven, and maintained that oil is well below where dinosaurs and large ferns supposedly left their spoils to somehow ferment into crude oil. Those critics maintain that crude oil is generated closer to the earth's core without the help of rotted organic matter.The Russians innovated deep well technology, enabling crude oil and gas extractions miles below the surface and well beyond where supposed fossil fuel crude deposits exist, to initiate their current surplus of crude oil and gas.And observations of known dry wells becoming wet again have caused observers to think that those lower regions are filling the more relatively shallow wells again. Either that or a bunch of dinosaurs sneaked in, died, and rotted quickly enough to provide refills of crude oil. [1]One of the most egregious events in addition to the spill itself was the cleanup fiasco. Several different cleanup solutions were offered. Some were proven and relatively safe for the environment, others were safe but unproven, and all of them were cost-effective.But BP had another plan. They wanted to flood the Gulf by air and water with Corexit 9500, a brew so toxic itself that its use has been banned off British shores. Right, the nation that houses BP world headquarters banned Corexit because of its toxicity. So why would BP want to use a more expensive cleanup solution than others less expensive and safer?Corexit was manufactured by a company within BP's own network, Nalco, which had executives from BP and Exxon on their board of directors. Richard Charter, advisor for Defenders of Wildlife, asserted this about the relationship between BP and Nalco's Corexit: "It's a chemical that the oil industry makes to sell to itself, basically." [2]You could call it financial incest, a win-win for BP and Nalco, but a lose-lose for many ecosystems in the Gulf area and beyond.Around that time, Mike Adams also pointed out how Corexit was a convenient way to hide the damage. It makes the sealifeby Corexit's toxic mix with crude oil sink to the ocean floor, out of media sight. It also sinks those nasty large oil slicks without really ridding them as well.Mike also mentioned how BP controlled the cleanup and the EPA or any other government department. [3]In other words, allowing BP perception control and increased profits from that incestuous financial relationship caused a worsening of this monumental uncapped sea floor gusher that continues to threaten several aspects of many ecosystems in and around the Gulf and beyond.According tocontributor Dr. Sherry Baker, the cleanup Corexit crude oil mix created a toxic brew 52 times worse than the oil well leak could have produced itself. She refers to an organism that was most affected known as "rotifers, a microscopic grazing animal that is key to the gulf's food chain."The Corexit-oil mixture killed many of the rotifers, a very basic critter in the Gulf's food chain. It also suppressed their eggs. In other words, the foundation of the Gulf's food chain was greatly diminished. Dr. Baker's article mentioned how some now think that allowing the oil to disperse without intervention, especially the Corexit intervention, would have been less ecologically destructive to the environment. [4]Florida State University Assistant Professor Olivia Mason's recent research showed that bacteria did not consume the most toxic parts of the oil spill in the water column plume or in the oil that settled on the seafloor. Those are called polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), semi-volatile organic compounds in crude oil that can cause long-term health problems and cancer."Those PAHs could persist for a long time, particularly if they are buried in the ocean floor where lack of oxygen would slow PAH degradation by microorganisms," said Mason. "They're going to persist in the environment and have deleterious effects on whatever is living in the sediment." [5][1] http://metaresearch.org [2] http://www.naturalnews.com [3] http://www.naturalnews.com [4] http://www.naturalnews.com [5] http://www.eurekalert.org