The biggest oil spill ever recorded around the United States occurred on March 24, 1989 off the coast of Alaska and leaked over 11 million gallons of crude oil. The ship that ran aground was the Exxon Valdez. This killed thousands of birds and other marine species. This picture shows the cleanup that was done. Cleanup took a few years to complete.
Oil spills are a huge problem for everyone involved, the country, the workers, and especially the wildlife. Oil spills are most known to happen when oil tankers run aground or sink, but there are other major sources. Spill could happen because of a leaking oil pipeline, or an accident at offshore drilling sites. Almost 14,000 oil spills are reported to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) every year. The National Contingency plan says that for inland oil spill, the EPA is in charge of making sure it’s cleaned up, and for coastal waters the coast guard has that job. Once an oil spill occurs the EPA records the oil spill in the Emergency Response Notification System. This system has records from every oil spill back to 1986. Well-trained workers know how to handle oiled birds and mammals. The first step is to control the oil spill at its source, and then keep animals away from possible contamination. Then they proceed to capture all the affected animals. As soon as a bird or animal is captured it is taken to a treatment center where it is washed, taken care of, and hopefully eventually released. The cleanup for the oil spill continues by using booms to move oil into a certain area where it is thoroughly cleaned up. Oil is also washed off the beaches and caught in another boom to be brought to the rest of the oil. To make sure that the area in an oil spill eventually gets back to normal, detailed pre-spill studies are sometimes taken to determine the physical, chemical, and biological characteristics of an area. Then the area is watched until it seems to be back to normal. The residue of spilled oil and water-in-oil emulsions (“mousse”) can smother marine animals and birds. Birds can also become covered in oil and lose their protective layer of warmth. In this way they can freeze. Toxic components of oil are lost rapidly through evaporation, so the chance of animals dying from swallowing oil is less likely. But, the less toxic components stay around longer, and can lead to impairment of an animal’s ability to reproduce, grow, feed, and do other important life functions. Turtles are particularly sensitive to oil spills because they surface to breath and they leave the water to breed, which gets them coated in oil. Fish living near the shore or in shallow water nursery grounds are at a greater risk because they are so close to the surface. Coral reefs are also at risk since they are in shallow water. If the living coral dies then the entire reef is in danger of being eroded or washed away. Also, oil spills are a nightmare to marshlands. The oil kills plants very easily, and is very hard to clean up in those areas.
A ship sank in Table Bay, near the two African islands of Robben Island and Dassen Island, where penguins breeding grounds are located. 44% (70,000 penguins) of African penguins were threatened.
