By Rowan Wolf
I am waiting for someone to turn the bad news of the Gulf into a money making opportunity. In the characteristic mumbles of our time, I can see a future where state tourism departments are hawking "Welcome to the new Dead Sea!"
As hundreds of thousands of gallons a day of oil (liberally seasoned with the Corexit dispersant) flow into the Gulf of Mexico, but we are told that the Gulf is large and the spill a minute amount within that vastness. Now we are watching the viscous oil killing the marshes of Louisiana and making its way around the Gulf - to Florida today.
And within that stinking sludge we see the birds and wildlife who have become so coated it is difficult to tell what they are.
Across the Gulf is an ever-growing "sheen" of oil - moving with the wind and the tide. However, not all the oil is on the surface. An unknown amount moves through the various depths and are subject to the complex edies and currents of any large body of water. In the Gulf of Mexico, the strongest current is the "Loop Current." That flow is already circulating the oil around the Gulf of Mexico including towards Cuba.
As the gushing oil has moved east, there is now public admission that the Atlantic is also at risk - particularly the East Coast of the U.S. The University Corporation for Atmospheric Research produced a simulation (below) and reported "Ocean currents likely to carry oil along Atlantic coast".
From YouTube posting by ncaruar
The simulation shows that the oil could hit not just the East Coast of the United States, but continue to drift towards the Mid-Atlantic - and the North Atlantic current. That path will ultimately take it to the Arctic. In its wake, will swim and feed the marine life of the coasts and marshes; the fish and mammals, the plankton and crabs. It will impact the entire marine food chain. While most of the impact will likely contaminate the life of the Gulf, it seems highly unlikely that it will stay there.
The BP disaster, also known as the Macondo Prospect well, could continue to gush until at least August 2010 - and perhaps much longer. Millions of gallons of oil and natural gas will create growing dead zones and plumes that capture all life in its wake. The Gulf of Mexico could indeed become a "dead sea" for decades. The question is whether the Atlantic will share that fate.
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