Scientists find giant oil plumes under Gulf
One is about 10 miles long, 3 miles wide and 300 feet thick
![]() |
Video |
BP hits another snag in effort to slow oil flow
May 15: In spite of an initial setback, engineers remain hopeful that they can slow the massive flow of oil from a broken pipe in the Gulf of Mexico. NBC’s Mark Potter reports. Nightly News |
More U.S. news from NYTimes.com |
External links |
![]() |
Slideshow |
more photos |
NEW YORK - Scientists are finding enormous oil plumes in the deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico, including one as large as 10 miles long, 3 miles wide and 300 feet thick. The discovery is fresh evidence that the leak from the broken undersea well could be substantially worse than estimates that the government and BP have given.
“There’s a shocking amount of oil in the deep water, relative to what you see in the surface water,” said Samantha Joye, a researcher at the University of Georgia who is involved in one of the first scientific missions to gather details about what is happening in the gulf. “There’s a tremendous amount of oil in multiple layers, three or four or five layers deep in the water column.”
The plumes are depleting the oxygen dissolved in the gulf, worrying scientists, who fear that the oxygen level could eventually fall so low as to kill off much of the sea life near the plumes.
Dr. Joye said the oxygen had already dropped 30 percent near some of the plumes in the month that the broken oil well had been flowing. “If you keep those kinds of rates up, you could draw the oxygen down to very low levels that are dangerous to animals in a couple of months,” she said Saturday. “That is alarming.”
The plumes were discovered by scientists from several universities working aboard the research vessel Pelican, which sailed from Cocodrie, La., on May 3 and appears to be the first scientific expedition to gather extensive samples and information about the disaster in the gulf.
Scientists studying video of the gushing oil well have tentatively calculated that it could be flowing at a rate of 25,000 to 80,000 barrels of oil a day. But the government, working from satellite images of the ocean surface, has calculated a flow rate of only 5,000 barrels a day.
The undersea plumes may go a long way toward explaining the discrepancy, suggesting that much of the oil emerging from the well could be lingering far below the sea surface.
The scientists involved in the Pelican mission, which is backed by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the federal agency that monitors the health of the oceans, are not certain why that would be. They say they suspect the heavy use of chemical dispersants, which BP has injected directly into the stream of oil emerging from the well, may have broken the oil up into droplets too small to rise rapidly.
|
“It appears that the application of the subsea dispersant is actually working,” Doug Suttles, BP’s chief operating officer for exploration and production, said Saturday after flying over the area above the oil well. “The oil in the immediate vicinity of the well and the ships and rigs working in the area is diminished from previous observations.”
Many scientists had hoped the dispersants would cause oil droplets to spread so widely that they would be less of a problem in any one place. If it turns out that is not happening, the strategy of using the chemicals could come under greater scrutiny. Dispersants have never been used in an oil leak of this magnitude a mile under the ocean, and their effects at such depth are largely unknown.
- Discuss Story On Newsvine
- Rate Story:
View popularLowHigh - Instant Message
MORE FROM U.S. NEWS |
|
Add U.S. news headlines to your news reader:
|
Boost your career with an online Degree. Pick from Leading Colleges!
www.EarnMyDegree.com
Sponsored links
Resource guide