Sargassum Mats Bp Oil Spill

After the bp spill in the gulf of mexico however the crews also pumped dispersants 5 000 feet below the ocean surface.

Sargassum mats bp oil spill.

Large scale oil spill incidents have included an april 2017 spill at pointe à pierre trinidad and tobago and a july 2017 oil spill in kingston harbor jamaica. They observed disappearance during and after the deepwater horizon spill and then conducted mesocosm experiments with louisiana sweet crude oil and corexit 9500 dispersant to test the fate of oiled sargassum they found that oil accumulated on the seaweed. As the ocean currents brought the spill into contact with sargassum oil would coat those same snarled branches and bladders of the seaweed. Floating mats of seaweed called sargassum provide key habitats for babies of many species now hopelessly contaminated.

Alabama scientists investigated oil spill effects on floating sargassum a critical seaweed habitat for many important gulf species. The tragedy is the sargassum floating seaweed aka gulfweed along with its animal inhabitants is directly threatened by the bp deepwater horizon gulf oil spill. Sargassum mats are feeding grounds for larger marine species including sea turtles. In recent years the caribbean region has faced challenges from oil spills and an influx of floating sargassum seaweed.

As the sargassum drifts with the wind and currents so does the oil. The interior and underside of these seaweed mats under normal conditions are wonderlands of life as every offshore fisherman knows. Bp oil disaster is not a spill. More like a catastrophe.

If an oil spill made its way somewhere like the sargasso sea a young sea turtle would encounter a much different scene. Mark dodd a wildlife biologist from georgia s department of natural resources surveying oiled sargassum seaweed in the gulf of mexico after the deepwater horizon oil spill in 2010. The commentary is a and provides a deep appreciation of this special floating world. That sargassum and all the creatures living in its leaves are particularly vulnerable to oil on the.

Illegal dumping of oil contaminated waste by ships operating in the region. A school of 3 pound mahi mahi shot from beneath the floating mat as they chased a swarm of sardines. Some of the oil sunk to the ocean floor preventing it from washing ashore.