ABC’s Bill Weir interviews Dr. David E. Guggenheim on Good Morning America (June 19, 2010) to discuss the impacts of the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill on wildlife, the pristine coral reefs of Cuba, and potential solutions to rescue the imperiled fishing industry.
President of 1planet1ocean, Dr. David Guggenheim, the “Ocean Doctor,” appeared on MSNBC‘s Dayside with Alex Witt on June 6, 2010 to discuss the impacts of the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill disaster in the Gulf of Mexico:
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Today NOAA announced further fishing closures in the Gulf of Mexico due to the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill. Now a total of 37 percent of federal Gulf waters are off limits to fishing, an area of nearly 89,000 square miles where NOAA considers fish and shellfish potentially too toxic for human consumption. For a region where commercial fishing is a vital part of the economy, the future of the region grows increasingly uncertain with each barrel of oil spewed into the deep Gulf waters.
There’s a solution: Rebuild the Gulf of Mexico fishery on land. Investing in “next-generation” sustainable land-based, closed-containment recirculating aquaculture systems (RAS) could keep the Gulf region in the seafood business profitably, while creating green jobs and reducing fishing pressure on wild stocks. What is “next-generation” RAS aquaculture? From the outside, many of the systems look like an ordinary warehouse. Inside, they’re a specially-constructed system of pumps and filters that recycle 99 percent of their water and grow healthy and heathful fish without chemicals, antibiotics or genetically-modified anything. Read more
Like closing your eyes after staring at a light bulb, the image of the vast, dark spill haunts me like an after-image that just won’t go away after more than a month of poring over satellite images and nautical charts of the vast BP oil spill spreading throughout the Gulf of Mexico. At some point, as I pondered the growing dark mass, I recalled the eerie 1984 film, 2010 (the sequel to Arthur C. Clark’s 2001: A Space Odyssey) and the massive dark mass that consumed the planet Jupiter. And it seemed a tad spooky that the year the author chose when Jupiter would face its ginormous black swath of destruction was…2010.? Not knowing where it would lead me, I decided I had to indulge my right brain today, so I cracked my knuckles, opened Photoshop and this image is the result.? Read more
This video highlights the vast diversity of marine life throughout the Gulf at risk from the BP Deepwater Horizon disaster. The video provides an underwater tour of the Gulf by sub and scuba, encompassing the U.S., Cuba and Mexico. Produced for the opening of the first State of the Gulf of Mexico Summit in 2006, it was also shown before Congress on 5/19/2010 as part of the testimony of Dr. Sylvia A. Earle.
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Seven Mile Bridge in the Florida Keys
On July 18, 1975, the tanker Garbis spilled 1,500 to 3,000 barrels of crude oil into the warm, turquoise, coral-rich waters roughly 26 miles south-southwest of the Marquesas Keys, Florida. The oil was blown ashore along a 30-mile stretch of the Florida Keys, east of Key West. I was 16 and enjoying my second summer at Seacamp, a marine science camp on Big Pine Key. Rumors of the spill raced throughout the campus until finally, instructor James Smithson decided to find out for himself what menace might be approaching. He took a small away team aboard his 21-foot Mako, “Isurus,” and made haste south toward the reef tract. We waited impatiently for word back as the sun fell to the horizon and scattered its tranquil orange glow across the water. What I saw next filled me with dread. The Isurus entered the harbor, its white hull stained with enormous swaths of dark brown oil. In that moment the menace was no longer abstract, and to my young mind, everything we treasured — the corals, the mangroves, the fish, the turtles –was on the brink of extermination. Read more
Cuba’s Northwestern Coast Along the Gulf of Mexico
For the most up-to-date information on the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill’s potential impacts on Cuba, please visit our special “Cuba at Risk” page.
Since its discovery of oil and natural gas reserves in the Florida straits, Cuba’s preparations for full-scale offshore oil and gas development has raised alarm in the United States, particularly in Florida where it is estimated that much of a catastrophic spill originating in Cuba would be swept by Gulf currents. Ironically, it is now Cuba that faces the threat of a massive oil spill by the United States. The disastrous oil spill from the BP Deepwater Horizon now threatens Cuba, the largest and most biologically diverse island in the Caribbean, due to those same Gulf currents. To make matters worse, the economic embargo imposed upon Cuba by the United States decades ago makes collaboration and coordination exceedingly difficult during this crisis. Read more
Remember Eastern Airlines? I do. And I’m forever grateful to the long-gone carrier for transporting me to a new world exactly 35 years ago, a world that I’ve never left. […]
