The Washing of the Oil

I went out again with Leanne Sarco, the Interpretive Ranger for Grand Isle State Park as she went out to Zone 15, on the eastern tip of Grand Isle, Louisiana.  Zone 15 has had oil sitting on its shores now for 13 weeks, and is where Leanne with her revolving volunteer army has been rescuing Hermit Crabs for over half of that time.  This day, the tide was high, so the main bar of exposed and accumulated oil was submerged, and was nearly covered with sand, and not quite noticeable to someone who might not know about the area’s history.

As we pulled up to the beach with our crew which included Rachel McKay Laskowski and Craig Hill from the World Animal Awareness Society, hundreds of birds flew up from the main contaminated shore.  Five species of Tern, Black Skimmers, Gulls, and shorebirds, which included a few Red Knots made up the group.  Migration is in full swing now, and shorebirds in the front yard as well as bright flecks of yellow plumage flitting through the live oaks is the order of business on the barrier islands of the Gulf Coast right now.

Short-billed Dowitchers in the front yard, 9/2/10. 

One pattern that has been emerging through my observations here is that just like the heaviest of the oil, roosting birds seem to prefer natural points along the front edges of the islands as well as the sandy coves on the inside.  From the air you can see that the oil tended to accumulate most in very predictable ways, usually heaviest on the eastern edge of points and spits on the gulf side of the islands.  It also wrapped around and came to rest in larger concentrations in small eddies and coves on the insides and in the channels that separate the islands.  Unfortunately, the points are also where birds tend to congregate as well.

Thick oil, just under the sand in Zone 15, Grand Isle, Louisiana 9/3/10. 

Many of these localities received many thousands of gallons of oil during the last weeks of May through the middle of June and continue to see higher concentrations of tarballs arriving on shore daily.  The clean up crews were so poorly organized and understaffed that the vast majority of this oil still remains, and has been covered in many cases by layers of sand.  The effort to clean the shoreline was in no way, shape or form adequate to deal with the severity and immediacy of the problem as the oil piled up on the shores of the Gulf, though BP had over a month to prepare.  The technology to remove this oil with vacuum trucks exists and was employed in very limited instances, but never attempted on any of these beach sites, even in areas accessible by motor vehicle.  And so the oil remains.

 Vacuum trucks like these can pump the emulsified oil out of the water in a fast and effective manner.  

Leanne told me that the Park staff had just heard about an application for a permit by BP to surf wash the contaminated sand of the park.  Some of this sand has several layers of very thick crude in it, not light contamination.  So, today they were gathering all of the contaminated sand dug up by the one crew working with shovels and the three “zamboni” sand collecting machines and piling it in great mountains, which if the permit goes through will be pushed toward the shoreline where the wave action will magically remove the oil from the ecosystem.  This is in spite of the fact that they have a centrifuge which they have been decontaminating sand with since mid-July, that supposedly can clean 50 tons of sand per hour.  Coast Guard chief Robert Laura on July 4th told me that it can handle more sand than they can bring in and will return the sand cleaner than when it came in.  Perhaps it’s just cheaper to push it into the ocean.

Tarballs on Grand Isle beach on 9/3/10.  This oil was scooped up by the zamboni and piled for the surf washing.

Since the media is no longer here, no one is asking the questions, and BP seems to have the run of things.  I have been in a deep depression for the last two weeks coming to terms with the fact that the nation’s attention span doesn’t seem to allow for any more real reporting about the spill.  One of the main problems is that to solve this issue involves confronting our very own personal behaviors and habits, and it makes it a much harder thing to deal with day in and day out.  We just want it to be rosey and good, and for the birds to live happily ever after, but that’s not the case. 

Unfortunately, the easy story, the one that hurts less, the one that those with most to gain are telling us, the one that has not been investigated from desks in D.C. and New York are the ones we hear in the media.  This perpetuation of the idea that some how the Gulf is just going to be ok, though most of the limited available science is pointing to the contrary is not acceptable.   It allows people who would otherwise question the situation to believe what the BP PR machine is telling the public, a machine that from day one has evaded the truth, dodged questions, hid evidence and did so in a potentially criminal manner.  These things were wrong, but when this same story is re-canted by the media and even environmental advocate groups the repercussions are far more serious.

Oil in Zone 15, Grand Isle State Park, September 3, 2010 

Read the original story at American Birding Association – Gulf Coast Oil Spill