The mission of Lower Mississippi RIVERKEEPER® is to protect, preserve
and restore the ecological integrity of the Mississippi River Basin for
current users and future generations through advocacy and citizen
action.
LEAN member and New Orleans photographer Jerry Moran revisited Raccoon Island on August 8, 2010 to find more of the same death and destruction that he found on his visit on July 18, 2010.
"death is everywhere and I mean everywhere, even though visible oil is much less an issue, which concerns me greatly. A lot of the birds that weren't dead, were obviously poisoned, almost acting drunk and dazed. Some were hardly walking, and some were alive, but lying where they will surely expire, some were actually fighting each other for food(surely contaminated).......It is really hard for me to believe that nothing can be done to curb what is no less than the extermination of our beloved state bird, along with thousands of other birds and animals. There are not many times where I have just stopped shooting and left....yesterday was one of those day's."
"The difference this time was that there were not as many (living) birds...... probably at least 60% less but just as much death if not more. Pelicans, Seagulls, Bull Redfish, Drum....you name it it was dead on the beach. Oil had hit Raccoon Island last week and the island was obviously manicured, BP had set up tents on the 2 adjoining Islands. All of the boom that was on the island and on top the jetties was gone, and the island was flat where it once had a more natural terrain....two of the pelicans had died very recently, and it was most disturbing that one of them was hooked to a sparkle beatle (a kind of fishing lure) which was tangled in dead mangrove.......I have no doubt that either Wildlife and Fisheries or BP workers had to have seen this Pelican while alive and just left him there to die. A lot of the dead birds stomach cavaties were open and a brown sludge covered the inside, with the scent of oil."
In our continuing effort to document and learn from the trajic events of the BP drilling disaster we are conducting regular excursions to the Mississippi Delta, taking water and soil samples and an efforts to determine what linguiring effects the spill will have on the toxcicty of our vanishing wetlands.
The question, 'where has all the oil gone?' has been answered in the media in recent days by scientists providing much speculation about how the oil may go away but little hard data about what is actually happening in the Gulf. We cannot let the future of the Gulf rest on speculation.
The danger of this conjecture is that people are already beginning to tune out and assume that everything is fine, even within the spill response.
So, where is the oil?
Oil in grass between Oyster Bayou and Taylor's Bayou, St. Mary's Parish, Louisiana, July 30, 2010, Photo Credit: Antonia Juhasz.
The BP oil can be found on the shores of St. Mary Parish. Just yesterday, July 30, 2010, stretches of shoreline along St. Mary Parish were found that were significantly oiled. This area was believed to be safe from the spill and was not given any attention by Unified Command. Even the St. Mary Parish President thought that they would not receive oil. (1)
Group working for law firms suing BP cites 'compelling evidence
by Amna Nawaz, Rich Gardella and Lisa Myers, NBC News
NBC News Investigative Unit
Lisa Myers' report on oil dispersants will air tonight, Friday July 30, on NBC Nightly News!
Amid growing concern about the use of dispersants in the Gulf of Mexico, a group of scientists working for law firms suing BP says their testing indicates that the dispersants being used to break up the oil are making this spill even more toxic to marine life.
Dr. William Sawyer, a toxicologist, is part of a team of scientists hired by law firms - led by Smith Stag of New Orleans - that are representing Louisiana fishermen and environmentalists.
The scientists collected and analyzed globs of oil, sand, and water from more than a dozen sites in four states along the Gulf.
Sawyer told NBC News that the findings are troubling. "We now have compelling evidence that the dispersant has enhanced and increased the toxicity from the spill," he said.
Last week, a group of independent scientists called for an "immediate halt" to the use of dispersants. In what was called a "consensus statement," they warned that dispersants pose "grave risks to marine life and human health."
Spreading the damage?
So far, the federal government has approved use of more than 1.8 million gallons of dispersant in the Gulf. Most of it is Corexit 9500.
