A Crisis in Coral?

 Posted by at 12:59 am  Politics
Nov 072010
 

Along with many others, I have been distrustful of the officially sanctioned news coming from the Gulf of Mexico.  I have opined that it will take at least a generation to repair the damage from the massive oil spill made possible by Republican deregulation of drilling practices, as pushed by Cheney, and the abject failure of Ken Salazar to do his job.  In May, I stated my concern that, since the dispersant BP used in huge quantities is lethal to coral, it could bring about the loss of Florida’s reef system, aka the Keys.  Those reefs are the home of thousands of species found nowhere else on earth.  We harvest some our most advanced medicines from some of those species.  In addition, the loss of the Keys would change the flow of the Gulf Stream and hasten a catastrophic change in climate.  For the first time, damaged corals have been found in the Gulf.

7coralFor the first time, federal scientists have found damage to deep sea coral and other marine life on the ocean floor several miles from the blown-out BP well – a strong indication that damage from the spill could be significantly greater than officials had previously acknowledged.

Tests are needed to verify that the coral died from oil that spewed into the Gulf of Mexico after the Deepwater Horizon rig explosion, but the chief scientist who led the government-funded expedition said Friday he was convinced it was related.

“What we have at this point is the smoking gun,” said Charles Fisher, a biologist with Penn State University who led the expedition aboard the Ronald Brown, a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration research vessel.

There is an abundance of circumstantial data that suggests that what happened is related to the recent oil spill,” Fisher said.

For the government, the findings were a departure from earlier statements. Until now, federal teams have painted relatively rosy pictures about the spill’s effect on the sea and its ecosystem, saying they had not found any damage on the ocean floor.

In early August, a federal report said that nearly 70 percent of the 170 million gallons of oil that gushed from the well into the sea had dissolved naturally, or was burned, skimmed, dispersed or captured, with almost nothing left to see – at least on top of the water. The report was blasted by scientists.

Most of the Gulf’s bottom is muddy, but coral colonies that pop up every once in a while are vital oases for marine life in the chilly ocean depths.

Coral is essential to the Gulf because it provides a habitat for fish and other organisms such as snails and crabs, making any large-scale death of coral a problem for many species. It might need years, or even decades, to grow back… [emphasis added]

Inserted from <Common Dreams>

This discovery in no way proves my fears, but it keeps them well within the realm of possibility.  We need to determine whether or not BP killed this coral and then determine how widespread the damage is.  Since I lack the scientific expertise to recommend how to prevent further damage, I’ll leave that to the scientists, but something must be done, and done quickly.  You know that when the next session of Congress begins, House Republicans will rusk to defund all skience [Republican spelling], protect BP from liability, and take the ostrich approach to this problem.

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  12 Responses to “A Crisis in Coral?”

  1. If I were to rant I would write ten thousand words about now but I won’t. I will only say we keep pounding nails into the coffin that we are burying ourselves in. God damn all who destroy when they could as easily build.

  2. The only hope of gaining any sort of Teapublican backing on issues of science is probably only
    1.) If scientific R & D is framed as an economic prospect for job creation. (And since we’re never going to get back to manufacturing jobs like days of yore, it really is about our only major option of job creation left to us.)
    2.) If alternative energy creation is framed as a defense measure – one that makes us much less reliant on foreign oil.

    Otherwise convincing Teapublicans (who deny global warming and think the earth is 6,000 years old) that science is actually a good thing is a lost cause. They are Luddites of the highest order!

    • 1.) For this to hold, the primary goal would have to be wealth transfer to the rich. Republicans are more interested in exporting jobs than creating them.

      2.) That has possibilities.

      They might also go for research into chastity belts.

  3. And they are thinking of making a global warming denier the head of that committee. We’ll probably get Inhofe. 😡

    Coral doesn’t just die that fast without a reason – you don’t have to be a scientist to know that. How do you put a price on dead coral. All that oil is still down there so it may take generations to recover it, if at all. Sad. 😥

    • Lisa, a Democrat will be head of that committee in the Senate, where Inhofe is. Global climate change denier, and BP apologist, Joe Barton is in line to head the House Energy Committee.

      Indeed it is.

      • This is why we need to get more actively involved in liberal and progressive social movements and organizations. We never could rely on the Democrats, and we have even less of an ability to do so now.

        • Lib, I will support them as long as they are the only game in town. I’m open to look at any reasonable alternative, but see none.

  4. Despite all of the devastating, immoral environmental distruction wrought by the BP oil spill, Americans still have short memories. I fear that many will forget the oil spill nightmare and allow for policies that caused it to continue.

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