Experts say Gulf of Mexico health nearly restored but fears remain

SCIENTISTS judge the overall health of the Gulf of Mexico as nearly back to normal one year after the BP oil spill, but with glaring blemishes that restrain their optimism about nature’s resiliency.

More than three dozen scientists grade the Gulf’s big picture health a 68 on average, using a 1-to-100 scale. What’s remarkable is that that’s just a few points below the 71 the same researchers gave last summer when asked what grade they would give the ecosystem before the spill. And it’s an improvement from the 65 given back in October.

At the same time, scientists are worried. They cite significant declines in key health indicators such as the sea floor, dolphins and oysters. In interviews, dozens of Gulf experts emphasised their concerns, pointing to the mysterious deaths of hundreds of young dolphins and turtles, strangely stained crabs and dead patches on the sea floor.

The survey results mirror impressions Jane Lubchenco, the head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, gave on the health of the Gulf ahead of the one-year anniversary of the spill tomorrow.

The Gulf is “much better than people feared, but the jury is out about what the end result will be,” she said. “It’s premature to conclude that things are good... We’re finding dead dolphins.”

Just as it was before the April 20 accident when the Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded, ultimately spewing 172 million gallons of oil, the Gulf continues to be a place of contradictions: The surface looks as if nothing ever happened while potentially big problems are hidden deep below the surface.

“When considering the entire Gulf of Mexico, I think the natural restoration of the Gulf is back to close to where it was before the spill,” said Wes Tunnell at Texas A&M University, who wrote a scientific advisory report for the federal arbitrator who is awarding money to residents and businesses because of the oil spill. Tunnell’s grades are typical. He says the Gulf’s overall health before the spill was a 70; he gives it a 69 now.

If that pre-spill grade isn’t impressive, it’s because the Gulf has long been an environmental victim — oil from drilling and natural seepage, overfishing, hurricanes and a huge oxygen-depleted dead zone caused by absorbing 40% of America’s farm and urban runoff from the Mississippi River.