Gulf Dead Zone Now Larger Than Connecticut

Monday, scientists released their annual measurement of the Gulf of Mexico’s Dead Zone, now 5,800 square miles, an area larger than the state of Connecticut. 

Wicked Problem

Marshland has some weapons: natural bacteria that degrade some of oil, a process Louisiana’s warm, humid climate might accelerate. Across Louisiana’s coast, however, an extensive water zone exists where oxygen level is so low, two milligrams per liter, fish cannot survive, what scientists call a “wicked problem.”

In that dead zone are embedded social, economic and political factors.

The Gulf Dead Zone extends from the mouth of the Mississippi River west to Texas. (Aviva Rahmani, The State of the Art of Dead Zones, Eugene Turner and Jin White interview, cited in Vampire of Macondo.)

The problem is rooted in higher profits for farmers with fewer subsidies, according to Dr. Eugene Turner, distinguished research master and professor at L.S.U.

Causes of the dead zone are stratification (colder and saltier with warmer water on the top), and nutrients from fertilizers that sink to the bottom where they feed algae and decompose. Some of the algae are toxic. (Dr. Turner says the algae are not concentrated enough to be used for biofuel.)

There’s nothing that can live in a dead zone except bacteria. Everything else suffocates from hypoxia. Currents and winds slosh the dead area on the Gulf bottom.

“This is a human footprint, not a natural one. It’s driven by changes in water quality along the coast. It’s only going to increase,” Turner says.

“The toxic blooms cause respiratory diseases and memory loss,” Turner says about algae. Red tides occurred years before this period of increasing Gulf Dead Zone. Incidents of red tides in the Gulf, however, are increasing and the size of the dead zone there is growing. According to Turner, the problem is too advanced now for bioremediation.

In addition, much of the surrounding area above Macondo Prospect will remain toxic, warns Richard Steiner, a retired University of Alaska marine-conservation professor.

When oil hits the cane stalks in the Louisiana Delta, it seeps straight down to the roots. It was anticipated that the protective cane and surrounding grass along Louisiana’s Gulf coast would soon turn dark brown and die. Much of it did.

On Grand Isle, on Day 44 of BP’s Gulf catastrophe, Jefferson Parish Councilman, Chris Roberts said his group was “detained because there was a decon unit that required many steps for anyone who’d been out on the beach. 
And based upon how they’re dealing with this oil that’s on the beach, it causes me to be quite concerned, because the oil is not just on the beach. It’s in our marshes. It’s very close to homes. It’s in – on boats. It’s on other equipment.”

Those decon units are no longer there. The poisons continue to spread. EPA continues to stall.

“Despite voluntary measures promoted by EPA and the states to curb Dead Zone-causing pollution, this area where oxygen levels get so low that sea life must swim away or suffocate has only grown bigger,” stated Senior Policy Director of Gulf Restoration Matt Rota in a written statement Friday. “Tell EPA to take real action to tackle this important issue.”

The Dead Zone threatens more than fish and fisherfolk in its immediate footprint.

“A ripple effect is felt throughout the Gulf’s $2.8 billion dollar fishing industry, with competition and crowding increasing as fishing fleets focus their efforts on unaffected areas,” Rota says. “Dead Zone-causing nitrogen and phosphorus pollution also creates environmental problems like toxic algae blooms throughout the entire Mississippi River Basin.”

“It’s a big problem, but EPA hasn’t shown much interest in taking big action to deal with it,” Rota continued. ”Although the EPA recently forced Louisiana to admit Dead Zone impacts on state waters, this declaration needs to be translated into real action to reduce it.”

“Over a decade ago, EPA called on states to curb Dead Zone-causing pollution, but since then, they’ve backed off deadline after deadline to actually do so,” Rota stated. “Click here to tell the EPA that now is the time to fix the Dead Zone.“

Overlooking Gulf Dead Zone’s Methane

Meanwhile, BP’s wrecked Macondo Prospect oilcano continues spewing oil and methane not only into the Gulf, but also further inland, adding to the death and destruction of the Gulf and its coastal inhabitants, including humans.

Oil has been tracked into the communities, into homes. 

It, along with Corexit, have also been tracked to bottom feeders that become pet food – and livestock feed, such as chicken feed. (Rotifers, bottom feeders, have also been found to be over 50 times more toxic from the carpet-bombed dispersant Corexit than from oil alone.)

New oil periodically washes ashore in Louisiana and Mississippi and as environmental attorney Stuart Smith has said, “There’s a deafening silence on the issue” from the U.S. military’s Coast Guard and from BP, the petrochemical military-industrial-complex (PMIC).

Oil gushing out of Macondo Prospect into the Gulf (as high as 100,000 barrels per day for almost two years) contained approximately 40 percent methane. Only 5 percent of methane is typically found in oil deposits.

That methane is contributing to oxygen-depleted “dead zones” throughout the ocean in which no sea life can survive for years. (Matthew Brown and Ramit Plushnik-Masti, Overlooked Danger in Gulf Oil Spill: Methane, The Associated Press, 18 June, 2010, cited in Vampire of Macondo.)

The only people kicked, however, were Gulf coastal residents. The covered-up Gulf Operation had become the largest legal case, the nation’s largest military maneuver, and the largest environmental and humanitarian catastrophe on the planet.

The Macondo well was never capped and BP could not pump enough Corexit dispersant into the plume to prevent it from reaching the surface, according to oil insider whistleblowers Ian Crane and the late Matt Simmons, who were proven correct about that, albeit quietly, very quietly.

“The growing number of [methane] bubbling sites, the unending sinkhole, the rig blowouts, all of this is gaining a sort of momentum that if, I recall, Matt Simmons stated it might do in a worst-case scenario,” commented a person with username Usefuleater. “If it is abiotic Methane Hydrates that are melting because of the Deepwater Horizon, then is this akin to champagne bubbles getting ready to pop a cork?”

Photo credit: NASA, NOAA

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Reporter, author and human rights professional for over 30 years, Deborah Dupré exposes lies and truths about the Gulf of Mexico oil operation In her book,“VAMPIRE of MACONDO: Life, Crimes and Curses in South Louisiana that Powerful Forces Don’t Want You to Know.” In “Vampire of Macondo,” Dupré exposes covered-up facts and victims’ gut-wrenching stories about the 2010 BP/government Gulf oil catastrophe, a continuing humanitarian and environmental historical event.