Current Event #3

Sunday, June 6, 2010
Washington Post- An econsystem that is altered perhaps forever
By Joel Achenbach and David Brown

Although this current oil spill, which is off coast of Louisiana, is not the worst in history it is rapidly coming close to it. The Ixtoc spill in 1979 is the one that still stands ahead of this spill. The spill is still not under complete containment after the cap that the British Petroleum engineers lowered into the mile deep geyser. About close to a half of the flow is being piped to a surface ship. If the governments estimates are correct there is about 23 million to 47 million barrels of oil that have spilled into the gulf so far. One of the National Wildlife Federation scientists said this spill will be lasting for years or worse decades to come. Some of the effects of this disaster are animals like seagulls soaked and suffocating on the coast. The oil which is still sitting around is effecting the the life in the gulf and environmentalist are worried, looking back at the detrimental effect of the past oil spills.

I never really knew that there have been so many oil spills in the past. It is terrible that we haven't yet found alternate energy or ways to prevent this from happening. I have been very interested in this oil spill and seeing the progress of it as we try to rid it from the ocean which is almost impossible. Other oil spills wiped out large populations of life and it is evident in this article the effect on seagulls. The is a picture of a man cleaning a drenched seagull suffocating from the large amount of oil. Also we cannot figure out the direct impact on this spill but we will figure it out in later years to come. I really did enjoy this article learning about the previous spills and the impact on the wildlife.