Posts tagged with

oil spill

High Water and Sunken Oil on the Great Mississippi

Posted Wed, 03/29/2017 - 14:29

If you can’t see spilled oil, how do you find it and clean it up?

That’s the situation emergency responders faced in two oil spills on the Mississippi River that challenged their understanding of how to approach evaluating oil spill conditions.

Below Zero: Partnership between the Coast Guard and NOAA

Posted Tue, 02/28/2017 - 15:25
By Lt. Cmdr. Morgan Roper, U.S. Coast Guard

For more than 200 years, the U.S. Coast Guard and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration have partnered together in maritime resiliency, environmental sustainability and scientific research. In fact, a variety of NOAA projects encompassed over 50 percent of Coast Guard Cutter Healy operations for 2016, including a Coast Guard and NOAA collaborative effort to chart the extended continental shelf and survey marine habitats and biodiversity. Today, more than ever in the past, the Coast Guard and NOAA are working together on numerous levels of profession in the U.S. Arctic Region, which happens to be Coast Guard Alaska‘s northern area of responsibility, or AOR. From daily sector operations and district-led full scale exercises to partnering on the national level in workgroups under the Arctic Council, Coast Guard and NOAA have a strong working relationship supporting and representing the U.S. in cold weather operations and Arctic initiatives.

Rescuing Oiled Birds, Leave it to the Experts

Posted Wed, 02/15/2017 - 16:01
By Allison O’Brien, Department of the Interior

This week, NOAA’s Office of Response and Restoration is looking at some common myths and misconceptions surrounding oil spills, chemical releases, and marine debris.

Birds, especially those that spend most of their time on the water, are vulnerable to the effects of oiling. Oil can clog feathers and cause them to mat, separate, or lose their natural waterproofing. Birds coated with oil may not be able to fly, may get sick from accidentally ingesting oil while trying to clean their feathers, or may drown from reduced buoyancy.

Restoration: The Other Part of Spill Response

Posted Tue, 02/14/2017 - 16:06

Typically, during an oil spill or chemical release, media images show emergency responders dressed in protective gear, skimming oil off the ocean’s surface or combing coastal beaches for oiled animals.

As dramatic as they are, those images can leave the impression that cleaning up after a spill is the end of the story. Often the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration continues working on spills years after response efforts have ended, determining how to restore the environment.

Zoos and Aquariums Training for Oil Spill Emergency Response

Posted Wed, 02/08/2017 - 16:11

When an oil spill occurs and photos of injured birds and other wildlife start circulating, there is often an immediate desire to want to help impacted animals.

One group that feels that desire strongly are the people who work at the nation’s accredited zoos and aquariums. For instance, during the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill, the Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA) was one of the largest organizations to mobilize volunteers in the Gulf of Mexico. Lessons learned from the Deepwater Horizon experience, both good and bad, led the association to launch a large-scale training program to certify members in hazardous response training.

Coping in the Aftermath of Deepwater Horizon

Posted Wed, 01/25/2017 - 18:00
By Tara Skelton, Mississippi-Alabama Sea Grant Consortium

Ever wonder about mental health issues in communities recovering from a man-made disaster? The Gulf of Mexico Sea Grant Oil Spill Science Outreach Team recently published an overview of peer-reviewed research into how individuals and communities coped in the aftermath of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. Studies show that the spill impacted the mental health of some coastal residents, including cleanup workers and those who relied on a healthy Gulf Coast for their occupations.

Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill Data: New Monitoring Updates

Posted Tue, 12/20/2016 - 18:52
By Alexis Baldera

The 2010 Deepwater oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico revealed a challenge with the way scientific monitoring information is shared and stored.

At the time, the scientific records of monitoring efforts in the Gulf of Mexico were dispersed across many entities from universities, natural resource management agencies, private industries to non-governmental organizations. In most cases monitoring systems were developed independently, often narrowed to specific questions, such as how many oysters should be harvested and how many should be left in the water?