http://thinkprogress.org/2010/05/08/oil-spill-animals /
The BP Oil Spill’s Toll On Gulf Coast Wildlife: ‘All Bets Are Off’
Orange-colored oil from the April 22 BP spill in the Gulf of Mexico has reached Louisiana’s fragile Chandeleur Islands, which are part of the Breton National Wildlife Refuge, an area that officials have now closed so that nesting sea birds will be undisturbed and to “allow cleanup operations continue uninhibited.” Environmentalists are increasingly worried about the toll the spill will take on more than 400 species in this rich nursery area. As Nancy Rabalais, a scientist who heads the Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium, said, “The magnitude and the potential for ecological damage is probably more great than anything we’ve ever seen in the Gulf of Mexico.”
ThinkProgress’ Brad Johnson was blogging from the Gulf Coast and spoke with Gulf Coast marine scientists who all agreed that the “unfolding oil disaster could mean devastation beyond human comprehension” and “all bets are off.” Ichthyologist Bruce Comyns, a research scientist at the University of Southern Mississippi’s Gulf Coast Research Laboratory elaborated on the devastating impact the spill may have on the region:
This is “the worst time” of year that this disaster could have begun, Dr. Comyns said, as this is the peak of the spawning and nesting season for marine wildlife in the Gulf, from fish to turtles to dolphins. As he has done in previous years, Dr. Comyns was planning to head out into the Gulf of Mexico to sample larval fishes from the edges of the Loop Current — a research trip that now has newly critical and disturbing import.
A look at what is happening to animals in the Gulf region, and the potential for more disaster:
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