Where can I find pictures of the gulf oil spill?”
Rescue workers carefully clean an oil-soaked northern gannet bird at a facility in Fort Jackson, Louisiana. Oil from the massive Deepwater Horizon rig spill began reaching the U.S. Gulf Coast on Thursday night, making its first landfall along Louisiana’s “bird’s foot” delta and barrier marshes. (See “Oil Spill Hits Gulf Coast Habitats.”) Louisiana’s coast serves as a winter resting spot for more than 70 percent of the country’s waterfowl, and the region is used by more than a hundred tropical migratory birds, said Melanie Driscoll, director of bird conservation for the National Audubon Society’s Louisiana Coastal Initiative. (See waterbird pictures.) Officials with the joint federal-industry team responding to the rig accident said that more than 217,000 feet (66,142 meters) of containment booms have been deployed to try to keep the oil slick from reaching the ecologically sensitive area. Wildlife workers are also firing loud cannons to “haze” birds from the water’s edge.
The effects of the oil spill last week are becoming more and more apparent and oil spill pictures provide a dramatic look at the devastation. The oil spill was caused by an explosion at an offshore drilling rig in the Gulf of Mexico. The leak is currently releasing 5,000 barrels of oil per day, and efforts to manage the spill with controlled burning, dispersal and plugging the leak have been unsuccessful. This oil spill is on track to become the worst oil spill in history, surpassing the damage done by the Exxon Valdez tanker that spilled 11 million gallons of oil into the ecologically sensitive Prince William Sound in 1989. Here are a series of oil spill pictures, depicting the scene in the Gulf of Mexico and the serious threats being posed to humans, the environment, and wildlife in the region.
