Over a year ago, Mother Earth was shattered with an oil spill of epic proportions. BP, the company responsible for the spill has apologized through the teeth despite environmentalists claiming that the recovery is far from over.
Regardless of the situation, the videos, photos, interviews and TV commercials, nothing speaks louder than numbers. In this video, the oil spill of all oil spills is broken down into items such as the number of gallons that could fill the Empire State Building.
What is the cost of spilling almost five million barrels of oil into the ocean? How do you measure that cost? In GDP reduction? In lives affected? In environmental impact? And how do you measure the cost when long-term effects are impossible to calculate yet, and when a significant portion of the spilled oil is still unaccounted for? One year since the Deepwater Horizon platform exploded, killing 11 workers, there are measurable effects, and many more unknowns. Collected here are pictures of the disaster, recent images of people affected by the spill, and views of the cleanup. Pictures #4 through #10 show areas of shoreline both immediately after the spill and the same area a year later. Click on the picture to see it change from the 2010 view to the present. [See also: The Big Picture: Oil reaches Louisiana shores, May 24, 2010] This effect requires javascript to be enabled. -- Lane Turner (36 photos total)
An oil tar ball washes up on Fourchon Beach in Port Fourchon, La. April 13. Tar balls and oil are still in abundance on the Louisiana coast a year after the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. (Dave Martin/AP)
An exhausted oil-covered brown pelican sits in a pool of oil along Queen Bess Island Pelican Rookery, three miles northeast of Grand Isle, La. on June 5, 2010. (Sean Gardner/Reuters) #
Dead sea turtles wash up on the same Waveland, Miss. beach on May 5, 2010 and April 14, 2011. Endangered sea turtles and dolphins are still dying in high numbers in Mississippi, which continues to be impacted by tar balls and weathered oil. [click image to see it fade] (Joe Raedle/Getty Images) (Mario Tama/Getty Images) #
Oil-smeared pelican eggs are seen in a nest on Cat Island, La. on May 22, 2010, and on the same spot on April 8, 2011. The view shows the island significantly eroded and the marsh grass and mangrove trees that pelicans nest on decimated. The island was covered by oil and poorly maintained booms impacted it as well. [click image to see it fade] (Gerald Herbert/AP) #
The same spot in Barataria Bay, La. on May 22, 2010, and April 8, 2011. In the first photograph, nesting pelicans land as oil washes ashore, and the second photograph shows the shoreline heavily eroded, with the lush marsh grass and mangrove trees mostly dead or dying. [click image to see it fade] (Gerald Herbert/AP) #
Oil impacts pelicans and mangrove in these photographs, made on the same spot on Cat Island, La. on May 23, 2010, and April 8, 2011. The island is home to brown pelicans, terns, gulls, and roseate spoonbills. [click image to see it fade] (Gerald Herbert/AP) #
A pelican and an egret, respectively, land on the same spot on Cat Island, La. on May 22, 2010, and April 13, 2011. [click image to see it fade] (Gerald Herbert/AP) #
Normal and eroded shoreline with healthy and dead mangrove, respectively, are shown on the same spot on Cat Island, La. on May 22, 2010, and April 8, 2011. [click image to see it fade] (Gerald Herbert/AP) #
Pelicans nest, and float offshore, respectively, in the same spot in photographs made on May 22, 2010, and April 8, 2011, on Cat Island, La. [click image to see it fade] (Gerald Herbert/AP) #
Courtney Kemp, widow of Roy Wyatt Kemp, 27, who died in the Deepwater Horizon oil rig explosion, holds her daughters Kaylee, 3, and Madisson, 9 months, in Jonesville, La. November 11, 2010. Roy Wyatt Kemp was one of 11 workers killed in the disaster. (Gerald Herbert/AP) #
Shrimper Sanh Dixie Le waits another day without shrimping, spending time on his boat "Quoc Viet", docked in Grand Isle, La., March 9. Le says after an average of eight hours of shrimping in the waters of the Gulf of Mexico he yields only three or four baskets of shrimp. He says BP offered him only $32,000, while other shrimpers have received $100,000. With gas prices high, he has to be selective about when he goes out. (Rod Lamkey, Jr./AFP/Getty Images) #
Crab fisherman Thomas Barrios and his wife Alicia pose in the back of the family restaurant Alicia runs, Barrios Seafood Restaurant, in Golden Meadow, La. The family's income is completely dependent on the bounty of the seafood industry. They had to lay off workers and are struggling to stay afloat, as his crabbing enterprise has been halted, and the restaurant sales have been less than half since the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. (Gerald Herbert/AP) #
Melvin Barnes, owner of Cuz's Seafood Restaurant and Market in Bay St. Louis, Miss., sits inside his empty restaurant on March 29. The oil spill closed waters that supplied much of the catch sold in the market. Customers stayed away from the restaurant, too, repulsed by the idea of eating Gulf seafood. Barnes sold off trucks to raise cash and is waiting for an interim compensation offer to arrive. (Gerald Herbert/AP) #
Mayor Stan Wright pauses in Bayou La Batre, Ala. The small fishing town is struggling to survive following the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. (Dave Martin/AP) #
Brad Mizell points to sores on his arm before attending a meeting for Gulf Coast residents who have health problems possibly related to the oil spill on April 18 in Bay St. Louis, Miss. Mizell worked on BP's Vessels of Opportunity program which hired local fishermen to help clean up the oil spill. He believes he was exposed to toxic dispersants and says he has since lost 50 pounds and developed a form of Rheumatoid arthritis and is now on 17 medications including steroids. More than 2 million gallons of the toxic dispersant Corexit were poured into the Gulf of Mexico following the spill. Corexit is banned in all of Europe because of its toxicity. (Mario Tama/Getty Images) #
Lorrie Williams is hugged by oil pollution activist Riki Ott as Bud Waltman (left) pauses at a meeting for Gulf Coast residents who have health problems possibly related to the BP oil spill April 18 in Bay St. Louis, Miss. Williams has developed a litany of illnesses since the spill including lung polyps along with liver, thyroid and blood problems. Ott is a marine biologist and former commercial fisherwoman who was affected by the Alaska Exxon Valdez spill and is now advising Gulf Coast residents. (Mario Tama/Getty Images) #
Fishermen and members of the community listen to Ken Feinberg, administrator of the BP claims fund, on March 28 at a public meeting in Mathews, La. (Julia Rendleman/The Houma Courier/AP) #
Brenda Guidry of Larose, La. holds her head in frustration during a public meeting with BP claims fund administrator Ken Feinberg on March 28 in Mathews, La. (Julia Rendleman/The Houma Courier/AP) #
Church members participate in an early morning prayer vigil to mark the one-year anniversary of the BP oil spill on April 20 in Orange Beach, Ala. (Mario Tama/Getty Images) #
Institute for Marine Mammal Studies veterinary technician Wendy Hatchett prepares to take a skin sample from a dead bottlenose dolphin that was found decomposing on Ono Island, Ala. and brought for examination to Gulfport, Miss. Since January, 155 young or even fetal dolphins and small whales have washed up dead on Gulf beaches - more than four times the normal amount - according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. A NOAA official called the oil spill "a possible cause" in the uptick in deaths. (Patrick Semansky/AP) #
Tulane University population ecologist Jessica Henkel takes a blood sample from a Dunlin sandpiper on Fourchon Beach in Port Fourchon, La., as part of a research project that is looking for long-term, lethal effects from the oil spill on birds that stop along the Gulf Coast during their migration. “It's much easier to see a dead pelican on the beach” than it is to see more chronic population-wide effects, Henkel said. (Patrick Semansky/AP) #
A dead endangered sea turtle is seen after it washed ashore and was flipped over by an activist April 16 in Pass Christian, Miss. The National Wildlife Federation reports that sea turtle strandings on the Gulf Coast were seven times the normal level in March. (Mario Tama/Getty Images) #
A commercial fishing boat sits anchored before sunrise in Grand Isle, La. April 20. Grand Isle is a coastal community centered around fishing and tourism that was heavily impacted by the oil spill. (Patrick Semansky/AP) #
A Louisiana National Guard helicopter flies over marshland on April 19 in route to Middle Ground in southern Louisiana. A year after the oil spill coated Gulf Coast marshes and beaches, BP claims that most of the oil has been removed. Louisiana Wildlife and Fisheries says, however, that much of the cleaning has been superficial, as the oil has seeped into the soil, killing marshes and further eroding the state's damaged delta ecosystem. (John Moore/Getty Images) #
Sunbathers stroll the beach as oil spill cleanup workers search for tar balls in Gulf Shores, Ala. April 20. Tar balls continue to wash ashore a year after the oil spill. (Dave Martin/AP) #
Robert Barham of the Louisiana Wildlife and Fisheries office digs up oiled sand on a beach on April 19 at South Pass in southern Louisiana. BP claims that most of the oil has been removed. Barham says, however, that much of the coastal cleaning has been superficial, as the oil has seeped into the soil, killing marshes and further eroding the state's damaged Mississippi Delta ecosystem. (John Moore/Getty Images) #
Workers clean a section of shoreline heavily damaged by the oil spill at the mouth of the Mississippi River where it meets the Gulf of Mexico. (Gerald Herbert/AP) #
A crew checks on propane-powered sound cannons used to keep birds from nesting in oil-soaked marsh grasses in Bay Jimmy, one of the hardest hit areas of coastal Louisiana on April 7. (Mira Oberman/AFP/Getty Images) #
Workers use a crane to remove clumps of shoreline heavily damaged by the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in Bay Jimmy in Plaquemines Parish, La. on April 8. (Gerald Herbert/AP) #
A woman walks along the beach as waves wash up from the Gulf of Mexico April 13 in Grand Isle, La. Residents report that oil still washes up onto the beach after storms. (Mario Tama/Getty Images) #
A group of scientists from the Manomet (Mass.) Center for Conservation Sciences spent months trying to catch, radio tag, and track the tiny oystercatcher, a rare shore bird, in order to help calculate the costs of the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Shiloh Shulte, coordinator of the American Oystercatcher Campaign, used an antenna to listen for a signal indicating life or death for a banded bird, while field technician Laura Koloski and Stephen Brown, director of Shore Bird Science, worked nearby in Grand Isle, La. on November 8, 2010. (Suzanne Kreiter/Globe Staff) #
On East Grand Terre Island, La., a pair of Oystercatchers walk on the beach in front of clean-up crews November 8, 2010. (Suzanne Kreiter/Globe staff) #
Since February 1, 2010, 443 dolphins have turned up "stranded"—a word that really, mostly means "dead"—on the beaches of Gulf Coast states. Most of these deaths coincide with the after-effects of the BP oil spill last spring. But not all. In fact, the spill happened on April 20, 2010, but March of that year was the single deadliest month for dolphins, with more than 60 strandings. That detail suggests there's more going on here than simple cause-and-effect oil-spill results.
The NOAA is calling the die-off an "Unusual Mortality Event"—making it rather different from the bird die-offs everybody was talking about earlier this year, which scientists said were common, expected, and had rather mundane explanations.
The NOAA is studying the event, trying to figure out what's happening. On their site, you can see how the deaths this year, and last, stack up against the average monthly dolphin deaths collected between 2002 and 2009. One interesting thing that stands out: March has been a bad month for dolphins for a long time. Over the last decade, it's been the month with the highest number of dolphin deaths. In 2010, that trend continued—it's just that the numbers of deaths in March, and the rest of the year, suddenly got much larger. So far, it's on track to be true for 2011, as well. Clearly, there's a natural mortality cycle that's being enhanced by whatever other factors are affecting the dolphins.
There've been 11 cetacean-centric Unusual Mortality Events in the Gulf since 1991, and 53% of those turned out to be caused by various biotoxin exposure. But, another 40% were never directly attributed to anything. It's difficult to fully understand die-offs like this, and there's a good chance that things will eventually go back to normal without us having ever figured out what's going on.
The state's struggle to deal with the remains of the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill can be seen in miniature in a broken stand of roseau cane in Pass a Loutre Wildlife Management Area, Wildlife & Fisheries Secretary Robert Barham said Tuesday morning.
View full sizePhotos by Michael DeMocker, The Times-PicayuneGarret Graves, chairman of the Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority, holds a tar ball Tuesday as Clint Dauphinet of the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries turns a shovel of oiled sand from just beneath the surface on a sand spit island near South Pass. Oil remains in coastal marshes one year after the BP oil spill.
When Barham scooped up a handful of earth, what oozed from between his fingers was a mixture of soil and oil.
"They made an attempt to try and clip some of this grass and make it grow, but it looks nothing like it did a year ago," Barham said of the cane stand along the pass.
"It was a thick, luscious, green, tropical marsh, and now you see a very weathered, stressed, unhealthy marsh situation," he said. "It won't be long before a lot of this is in water."
Indeed, wildlife agents hammered poles of plastic pipe along the water's edge in the days after the spill, and since then, the shoreline has retreated several yards.
The ooze of oil came from beneath the ground. There, it mixed with the roots of the cane stalks that had sprung to life after an original die-back and are now turning brown again.
Barham and Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority Chairman Garret Graves were leading a tour of reporters and photographers to several oiled spots on the state's southernmost coastline to reinforce their argument that BP and its cleanup contractors should not abandon their efforts to find -- and remove -- oil from the coast.
The 115,000-acre Pass a Loutre Wildlife Management Area was the first such area established by the state, nearly 100 years ago. It stretches east from Southwest Pass, the main shipping channel of the Mississippi River, to a part of the Gulf of Mexico north of Breton Sound.
It was among the first sections of coastline affected after oil began spewing from BP's Macondo well, and has been one of the most difficult locations to clean.
The oil Barham was dipping into had washed several dozen yards into these wetlands on high tides, or possibly on surge created by a tropical storm just offshore last year. Tidal forces attempting to pull oil and water back out of the area were stymied by the slightest of natural ridge features, causing the oil to pool and sink into the soft root system.
Cleanup contractors paid by BP removed oil from the surface, but determined that no further cleaning would be successful in this secluded patch, Barham said.
"No further cleanup necessary," he snorted as the oily soil dripped from his fingers. "You can smell that smell. There's a surge of odor that comes out of this marsh."
Barham said the state has unsuccessfully urged BP to allow Louisiana State University scientists to grow oil-eating microbes that could be injected into the oiled wetland to speed its cleanup, now that BP had determined that traditional cleanup methods will no longer be successful.
"If you're ever going to have a place, it looks like this is certainly the place to do some things like that," he said. "In this terribly oiled area that still has residual oil that's down just as far as you can pry."
His comments were interrupted by staccato booms from air cannons positioned at several locations within the tall grasses.
The noise of the cannons, combined with the swish and flash of metallic strips flapping from poles above the cane, are designed to keep birds from settling into the oily area.
View full sizeDried oil on a sand spit island near South Pass on Tuesday shows that oil remains in coastal marshes one year after the BP oil spill.
"This is the very terminal end of the Mississippi Flyway," said Todd Baker, biology program manager for Wildlife & Fisheries. "You get a wide variety of birds, waterfowl, neotropical migrants, raptors, all of them. When they come through, this is the first piece of land they see. When they leave, this is the last place they rest up before they jump across the Gulf of Mexico.
"The hazing cannons are not foolproof," Baker said, as a Louisiana red-winged blackbird chirped from atop a cane stalk a few yards away.
About 15 miles away as the birds fly -- or 30 by boat -- Graves used a shovel and his hands to dig about a foot beneath the surface of a spit of sandy beach at the end of South Pass, turning over black-stained sand that smelled like diesel.
View full sizeThe marsh plants are brown and dying on the Middle Ground.
In the background, earth-moving equipment stood at the ready to churn the stained soil to the surface so the oil could weather and, hopefully, disappear.
A hundred yards away, outside a line of protective boom, dozens of laughing gulls and least terns perched on another non-oiled part of the spit.
Again, air cannons sporting poles with metallic streamers were strategically positioned throughout the oiled section of the beach, with the booms and flapping aimed at keeping birds away from the toxic contaminants.
Today, Graves, Barham and other members of the coastal authority will tour Bay Jimmy, in northernmost Barataria Bay, before holding a noon news conference with Gov. Bobby Jindal on Grand Isle to commemorate the Deepwater Horizon anniversary.
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View full sizeGarret Graves, chairman of the Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority, holds a tar ball Tuesday as Clint Dauphinet of the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries turns a shovel of oiled sand from just beneath the surface on a sand spit island near South Pass. Oil remains in coastal marshes one year after the BP oil spill. 
View full sizeDried oil on a sand spit island near South Pass on Tuesday shows that oil remains in coastal marshes one year after the BP oil spill. 
View full sizeThe marsh plants are brown and dying on the Middle Ground.