As if the Gulf of Mexico didn’t have enough problems, what with the oil slicks and tar balls, the dispersant being used to clean up the mess, may be having an adverse effect on the local marine life.
Ben Raines, an environmental reporter for the Mobile Press-Register, has been shooting video of some pretty strange going ons in the Gulf. It is widely believed that the dispersant are the root of the trouble, rather than the oil spill itself.
Ben Raines counted out over 20 sharks swimming around his tiny vessel, in 6 feet of water located off the Bon Secour National Wildlife Refuge. He managed to capture the silhouettes from above the water. They were so immense in number that he stuck his camera under the water for a better view, and a bunch came into focus.
Ben proceeded to film from the beach out. An incredible number of tiny fish swept by in the shallows; literally tens of hundreds anchovies could be seen piled up, their lifeless bodies splayed on the sand.
There was a shark within 100 yards, and that is just not normal. Raines is not alone in his observation of the odd shark behavior. In the past month, beach goers in Florida were shocked to find an 11 foot, 800 pound tiger shark, close to shore, swimming in the surf. The shark was acting as if exposed to oil.
This wasn’t the only shark to exhibit this odd behavior, researchers have taken note of at least two dozen deep water sharks have been discovered within six miles of the shore, far closer than normal.
It isn’t just sharks which are exhibiting this behavior but all manners of marine life are also acting off.
The reason for this has been boiled down to the dissolved oxygen pockets which are developing all over the Gulf. It is thought that it’s not just the oil that is causing this, but also the 1.5 million gallons of dispersant which BP has used to try and clear up the mess.
The reason for this is that the bacteria which break up the oil need oxygen. These bacteria take the oxygen from their surroundings, and this causes the marine life to leave the area. If they can’t leave they just die, and this is bad because then the bacteria need even more oxygen to complete the cycle and break down the decaying sea life.
There have been many arguments that P didn’t have to use dispersant in order to clean up the spill. Many people feel that there are better ways, such as burning it, skimming it, or any other multitude of ways.
It is unclear why an alternative method for cleaning up the spill, however it is quite clear that in attempting to clean up the spill using dispersant, they haven’t really helped the matter, but rather compounded it. Sure they were taking care of the problem on the surface, but not below it.. Lending credence to the saying “Out of sight.. Out of mind…”