Oil spill ‘already damaging ecosystem’

AS Americans anxiously waited for a slick in the Gulf of Mexico to wash up along the coast, globules of oil were already falling to the bottom of the sea, where they threatened virtually every link in the ocean food chain, from plankton to fish on dinner tables everywhere.

Meanwhile, a giant concrete-and-steel box, seen as the best short-term solution to bottling up the disastrous oil, was loaded onto a boat and the 100-ton contraption began its journey to the leak site about 50 miles off the Louisiana coast.

Oil has been gushing into the Gulf of Mexico at a rate of at least 200,000 gallons a day since an offshore drilling rig exploded last month and killed 11 people.