2 Years after BP’s Big Spill
Ships battle to put out a blaze after the biggest accidental oil spill in history, April 22, 2010. Photo courtesy flickr.com/photos/skytruthAudio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
It’s two years to the day since an explosion rocked the Deepwater Horizon oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico. For StateImpact Texas, KUT’s Terrence Henry looks at lessons learned and how the Gulf Coast has recovered.
The blowout at the BP rig wasn’t just a spill. It was a disaster. Eleven people were killed in the explosion. More than 200 million gallons of oil leaked into the Gulf of Mexico — the biggest accidental oil spill in history.
And now, two years later, what has been the impact on the Texas coastline? Dr. Paul Bommer, a professor at the University of Texas, was on a national panel of engineers that looked at the causes of the spill.
“I think the impact to the Texas impact so far, as I have read about it, has been minimal. The oil went primarily the other way,” Bommer said. “It went to Louisiana [and] as far away as the Florida Panhandle. But a lot of it appears to have been dispersed.”
But after disasters like the BP oil spill or the Exxon Valdez, the question arises: Are incidents like these just a fact of life in an oil-dependent world?
To see photos of the spill and read more about the recovery process, visit the StateImpact Texas website.
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