Odd Animal Deaths, Deformities Linked to Gulf Oil Spill?

(Really? Scientists are befuddled? They can't link these deformities and deaths to the spill? Or is it that they won't for some "mysterious" reason? Bring in different scientists then. Ones who aren't scared or easily bought off.--jef)

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Scientists befuddled by dolphin deaths, diseased fish.

On the first anniversary of the Gulf oil spill, scientists are observing strange deaths and deformities in animals that could be related to the disaster, experts say.

Ker Than

for National Geographic News

Published April 19, 2011

In the past six months, the numbers of dolphin and sea turtle deaths in the Gulf of Mexico (map) have risen, and some fish that inhabit the Gulf's coral reefs have developed abnormalities.

Yet projects to document and measure the oil's effects on Gulf marine life are still in the very early stages, scientists caution. Preliminary results may not be available for months, and it may be several years before any kind of scientific consensus is reached.

Such uncertainty is not unusual for oil-spill studies, noted William Patterson, a marine biologist at the University of West Florida (UWF) in Pensacola.

"If you look at the literature surrounding the Exxon Valdez oil spill [in 1989], there are still some unknowns associated with that," Patterson said.

"What we know [in the case of Exxon Valdez] is that there was an insult to the system, that there were effects on the food web and ecosystem, and that some species have not recovered to the levels they were at before." (Related: "Exxon Valdez Anniversary: 20 Years Later, Oil Remains.")

Some of the Exxon Valdez oil's effects are circumstantial evidence, he added, "but it's pretty compelling evidence."

Mysterious Spike in Dolphin, Turtle Deaths

This winter, an alarmingly high number of bottlenose dolphins—113 at last count—washed up dead on U.S. shores, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). The agency confirmed in early April that six of the bodies had Deepwater Horizon oil on them.

(Read more: "Dolphin-Baby Die-Off in Gulf Puzzles Scientists.")

"What's important to note, however, is that even though they have this oil on them, it may not be the cause of death," Blair Mase, NOAA's marine-mammal investigations coordinator, told reporters at a news briefing April 7.

"That's something the investigative team and our working groups are looking into."

So far this year scientists have also seen a rise in deaths of various species of Gulf sea turtle hatchlings. But NOAA researchers say the culprits may be contact with boats and fishing gear and possibly poisoning by toxins in algal blooms, which naturally appear in the Gulf each spring.
"The carcasses that we have looked at . . . had no visible oil on them," said Barbara Schroeder, national sea turtle coordinator for NOAA.
 
Fish Found With Deformed Ovaries, Missing Fins 

Meanwhile, other researchers are looking for effects of the oil on other marine species, such as fish, crustaceans, and corals.

UWF's Patterson has recently observed an increase in physical abnormalities consistent with oil exposure in red snappers that live in Gulf coral reefs.

"There are parasites showing up on the fish. They're always present, but this fall and winter we're seeing them in what appears to be higher abundances," Patterson said.

Some of the fish are suffering so severely from a disease called fin rot that entire fins are missing—something Patterson said he has never seen before. Some female red snappers also have been discovered with hardened or deformed ovaries.

(Also see "Sex-Changing Chemicals Can Wipe Out Fish, Study Shows.")

Other red snappers have strange pigmentation issues, Patterson said. "We have some images of red snappers sent to us by commercial fishermen that have black bands across the sides of the fish that is discolored skin."

These symptoms are not unusual in themselves, Patterson said, but the fact that they're appearing at what looks to be increased rates at the same time concerns him.

"Some of these things that we're seeing are classic symptoms of hydrocarbon exposure that have been documented in lab studies."

For example, the odd pigmentation could be caused by the fish's kidney or bile duct being affected or clogged by oil components.

"So it does seem to be pointing in one direction, but we don't have anything definitive yet to tell the full story."

Chuck Jagoe, an environmental toxicologist at Florida A&M University in Tallahassee, is working with Patterson to test Gulf red snappers for telltale enzymes that are produced when the fish flush toxic oil components from their bodies.

"These enzymes are associated with the detoxification process," Jagoe said.

"They can give us an indication that the animal has not only been exposed to [oil] compounds, but that the compound is having some kind of biological effect."

Jagoe has just begun testing the fish, and the first results won't be available until at least early summer.

One Species Not Enough Evidence

UWF's Patterson said he also plans to investigate whether other Gulf species are exhibiting symptoms similar to those of the snappers.

Even nearly a year after the disaster, oil could still be lurking in the Gulf's waters, he added.
"Oil is not one thing," Patterson said. "It's thousands of organic compounds. Some of them are fairly [unstable] and microbes break them down very quickly, while others could persist for a long time."

(See "Why the Gulf Oil Spill Isn't Going Away.")

Finding other affected species will be crucial to making a case that the oil spill is having a systemic effect on Gulf fish species, said Prosanta Chakrabarty, a fish biologist at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge who was not involved in the snapper project.
"With one species, we can't really tell," Chakrabarty said.

He also noted that red snappers are already a vulnerable species due to overfishing, and that it's possible the symptoms that Patterson is seeing are due to inbreeding caused by a decreased population.

Whatever the cause of the deformities, though, "the oil spill didn't help any," he said.

Fish Populations Measured via GPS

Chakrabarty is involved in another project called Depthmap, which aims to use fish-population data collected using GPS technology before and after the spill to investigate the Gulf oil spill's impact on marine life. Museum records are also used to fill out pre-spill data.

"If, for example, 80 percent of Gulf pancake batfishes were found off the coast of Louisiana and they're not there anymore," then that could be an indication the spill negatively affected the species, he said.

And if this pattern is repeated for many fish species, it would indicate the spill has had a pervasive impact on Gulf marine life.

Chakrabarty's team hopes to gather pre- and post-spill population data for 600 fish species in the northern Gulf, but has only begun analysis for a fraction of that number due to limited funding.

His early results suggest that of the 53 species examined so far, 43 had major populations that lived in regions that were in the path of the spill.

Deep-Sea Effects Leave Scientists in the Dark

Even if Depthmap's goals were met, however, scientists would still know only about the impact the spill had on fish that live in relatively shallow water. But the spill's largest potential damage is to deep-sea creatures, Chakrabarty said. (See pictures of deep-sea animals.)

The broken wellhead blew at 5,000 feet (1,500 meters) underwater, and plumes of gushing oil floated nearly 1 mile (1.6 kilometers) up from the seafloor, polluting different layers of water as they rose.

"We knew that the oil wouldn't last at the surface for very long, but what happened at the deep sea?" Chakrabarty said.

Of particular concern, he added, are the effects of the oil dispersants piped into the waters near the wellhead in a desperate bid to break apart the oil before it reached the surface.

"The deep sea is such a stable environment. . . . It isn't used to perturbations like this influx of [dispersants]," Chakrabarty said.

"So what the impact [is] of having [dispersants] enter that area, even momentarily, is difficult to understand."

(See "Gulf Spill Dispersants Surprisingly Long-lasting.")

Despite his concerns about the deformed fish, UWF's Patterson added that it's important for scientists not to jump to conclusions.

"As scientists, we shouldn't be unwilling to say we're not quite sure," he said.

"Instead of going out on a limb and making grand announcements, I think it's a safer approach to say, Well, these are issues that we're seeing that we're not able to attribute to any one thing, but we're concerned about them.

"And that's where we are."

BP Anniversary: Toxicity, Suffering and Death

Sunday, April 17, 2011 by Al-Jazeera-English
The Gulf of Mexico oil disaster has caused the biggest chemical poisoning crisis in US history, experts say.

by Dahr Jamail - Al Jazeera

April 20, 2011 marks the one-year anniversary of BP's catastrophic oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. On this day in 2010 the Deepwater Horizon oil rig exploded, causing oil to gush from 5,000 feet below the surface into the ninth largest body of water on the planet.

 Medical and toxicology experts have told Al Jazeera that the oil spill has triggered environmental and human health disasters that will likely span decades.
(Erike Blumenfeld/Al-Jazeera) At least 4.9 million barrels of BP's oil would eventually be released into the Gulf of Mexico before the well was capped 87 days later.

It is, to date, the largest accidental marine oil spill in the history of the petroleum industry. BP has used at least 1.9 million gallons of toxic dispersants to sink the oil, in an effort the oil giant claimed was aimed at keeping the oil from reaching shore.

Critics believe the chemical dispersants were used simply to hide the oil and minimise BP's responsibility for environmental fines.

Earlier this month Transocean Ltd, the owner of the Deepwater Horizon, gave its top executives bonuses for achieving what it described as the "best year in safety performance in our company’s history". Transocean CEO Steve Newman’s bonus was $374,062.

BP has plans to restart deepwater drilling on 10 wells in the Gulf of Mexico this summer after being granted permission by US regulators.

Meanwhile, marine and wildlife biologists, toxicologists, and medical doctors have described the impact of the disaster upon the environment and human health as "catastrophic," and have told Al Jazeera that this is only the beginning of that what they expect to be an environmental and human health crisis that will likely span decades.

The demise of gulf vertebrates

Less than four months after the disaster began, very large fish-kills began to appear along the coasts of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Florida.

On August 18, a team from Georgia Sea Grant and the University of Georgia released a report that estimated 70-79 per cent of the oil that gushed from the well "has not been recovered and remains a threat to the ecosystem". More recent studies estimate that figure could be closer to 90 per cent.

Dr Ed Cake, a biological oceanographer, as well as a marine and oyster biologist, has "great concern" about the fish kills over the last year, which he feels are likely directly related to the BP oil disaster.

In recent months, more than 290 corpses of dolphins and their newborn have washed ashore in the areas of the Gulf most heavily affected by the disaster, along with scores of dead endangered sea turtles.

"If we use several models to see what is going on, the sea turtles and neo-natal dolphin deaths, the impacts of the dispersed oil are lingering", Cake told Al Jazeera. "The oil is out there and still coming onto our shores".

On May 20 of last year, the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) told BP it had 24 hours to find a less toxic alternative to its dispersants, but the EPA's request was ignored.

Then on May 25, BP was given a directive by the EPA to scale back their spraying of the Gulf of Mexico with dispersants. The US Coast Guard overlooked the EPA's directive and provided BP with 74 exemptions in 48 days to use the dispersants.

A March 1987 report titled Organic Solvent Neurotoxicity, by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), states:

"The acute neurotoxic effects of organic solvent exposure in workers and laboratory animals are narcosisanaesthesiaia, central nervous system (CNS) depression, respiratory arrest, unconsciousness, and death."

The dispersants are banned in at least 19 countries, including the UK.
Cake’s assessment for sea turtle and dolphin populations in the Gulf is bleak.

"The two models of the turtles and dolphins indicate that something is drastically wrong in the marine environment, that I believe point towards the demise of these vertebrates in the Gulf."

Underscoring his concern, a new study published in Conservation Letters this March reveals that the true impact of BP’s oil disaster on wildlife may be gravely underestimated.

The study argues that fatality figures based on the number of recovered animal carcasses will not give a true death toll, which may be 50 times higher than believed since most carcasses sink before they are spotted.

Cake believes the National Marine Fisheries Service and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) have been remiss in determining the cause of the deaths.

"In the year since the spill began, NOAA admits to doing no tissue sampling, which to me is scientifically incredible, for if you have forensic samples, you are bound by protocols to have them analysed right away so they do not degrade, unless your purpose is not to know what is killing these dolphins", he said.

In February the Obama administration, via the National Marine Fisheries Service, issued a gag order to force marine scientists who were contracted to document the spikes in dolphin mortality and to collect specimens and tissue samples to keep their findings confidential.

Bleak prognosis

Dolpins and sea turtles can be considered the canaries in the coalmine in the Gulf since they are at the top of the food chain and directly reflect what is happening to the marine environment in which they live.

Ed Cake, a biological oceanographer, as well as a marine and oyster biologist, has "great concern" about the fish kills over the last year, which he feels are likely directly related to the BP oil disaster.

"Adult dolphins systems are picking up whatever is in the system out there, and we know the oil is out there and working it’s way up the food chain through the food web and dolphins are at the top of that food chain."

Cake explained: "The chemicals then move into their lipids, fat, and then when they are pregnant, their young rely on this fat, and so it’s no wonder dolphins are having developmental issues and still births".

Since last fall, Dr Wilma Subra, a chemist and Macarthur Fellow, has been conducting tests on seafood and sediment samples along the Gulf for chemicals present in BP’s crude oil and toxic dispersants.

"Tests have shown significant levels of oil pollution in oysters and crabs along the Louisiana coastline", Subra told Al Jazeera, "We have also found high levels of hydrocarbons in the soil and vegetation."

Cake, who lives in Mississippi, said:

"In the past months we’ve lost the young of the year population of dolphins in this area. We are not seeing any young of the year dolphins in the Mississippi and Alabama coastal area. The question is, for us as humans, could we withstand a similar impact if all our children were born dead because of environmental pollutants? I would say we could not."

It has been more than 31 years since the 1979 Ixtoc-1 oil disaster in Mexico's Bay of Campeche, and the oysters, clams, and mangrove forests have still not recovered in their oiled habitats in seaside estuaries of the Yucatan Peninsula.

It has been over 21 years since the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil disaster in Alaska, and the herring fishery that failed in the wake of that disaster has still not returned.

From a biological oceanographer’s perspective, we are still in the short-term impact stage of BP’s oil disaster. Cake, who is 70-years-old, said:

"I will not be alive to see the Gulf of Mexico recover. Without funding and serious commitment, these things will not come back to pre-April 2010 levels for decades."

Toxic chemicals 'in the air'

Two-year-old Gaven Tillman of Pass Christian, Mississippi, has been diagnosed with severe upper respiratory, sinus, and viral infections. His temperature has reached more than 39 degrees and he has been sick since last September.

"He has been seen by nine different doctors and had twenty-four doctor & ER visits," Shirley Tillman, his grandmother and former BP oil cleanup worker told Al Jazeera, "Some of his diagnoses include severe inflammation of his upper sinuses, upper respiratory infections, ear infections, sore throats, headaches, fever, vomiting & diarrhea."

Both Shirley and her husband Don's blood tested positive for chemicals from BP's crude oil, but now Gaven's blood has tested positive as well.

"We expected to find BP’s toxins in our bodies after working in the VOO [Vessels of Opportunity] program," she added, "But we did not expect our two-year-old grandson to test positive for having them too, with levels higher than ours. He has not been to the beach and has not eaten any seafood. Therefore, it is in the air."

Dr Riki Ott, a toxicologist, marine biologist, and Exxon Valdez survivor, told Al Jazeera that: "The dispersants used in BP's draconian experiment contain solvents such as petroleum distillates and 2-butoxyethanol.

Solvents dissolve oil, grease, and rubber", she continued, "It should be no surprise that solvents are also notoriously toxic to people, something the medical community has long known".
"They evaporate in air and are easily inhaled, they penetrate skin easily, and they cross the placenta into fetuses."

"For example, 2- butoxyethanol [in BP’s Corexit dispersants] is a human health hazard substance; it is a fetal toxin and it breaks down blood cells, causing blood and kidney disorders", Ott said.

Pathways of exposure to the dispersants are inhalation, ingestion, skin, and eye contact. Health impacts include headaches, vomiting, diarrhea, abdominal pains, chest pains, respiratory system damage, skin sensitization, hypertension, central nervous system depression, neurotoxic effects, cardiac arrhythmia, and cardiovascular damage. They are teratogenic, mutagenic, and carcinogenic.

Since last July, Al Jazeera has spoken with scores of Gulf residents, fishermen, and clean-up workers who have blamed the aforementioned symptoms they are experiencing on the chemicals from BP's oil and dispersants.

"I have critically high levels of chemicals in my body,” 33-year-old Steven Aguinaga of Hazlehurst, Mississippi told Al Jazeera.

Aguinaga and his close friend Merrick Vallian went swimming at Fort Walton Beach, Florida, in July 2010.

"At that time I had no knowledge of what dispersants were, but within a few hours, we were drained of energy and not feeling good,” he said, "I’ve been extremely sick ever since.”

According to chemist Bob Naman, these chemicals create an even more toxic substance when mixed with crude oil.

"I’m scared of what I’m finding," Naman, who works at the Analytical Chemical Testing Lab in Mobile, Alabama, added, "This is an unprecedented environmental catastrophe."

Aguinaga’s health has been in dramatic decline.

"I have terrible chest pain, at times I can’t seem to get enough oxygen, and I’m constantly tired with pains all over my body,” Aguinaga explained, "At times I’m pissing blood, vomiting dark brown stuff, and every pore of my body is dispensing water.”

And Aguinaga's friend Vallian is now dead.

"After we got back from our vacation in Florida, Merrick went to work for a company contracted by BP to clean up oil in Grand Isle, Louisiana,” Aguinaga said of his 33-year-old physically fit friend. "Two weeks after that he dropped dead."

Problems will continue

Most of the human blood Dr Subra has tested has toxic chemicals present at levels several times higher than the national average.

"Ethylbenzene, m,p-Xylene and Hexane are volatile organic chemicals that are present in the BP crude oil", she said. "We are finding these in excess of the 95th percentile, which is the average for the entire nation. Sometimes we’re finding amounts five to 10 times in excess of the 95th percentile."

Ethylbenzene is a form of benzene present in the body when it begins to be broken down. m,p-Xylene is a clear, colorless, sweet-smelling, flammable liquid that is refined from crude oil and is primarily used as a solvent.

Al Jazeera asked Subra what she thought the local, state and federal governments should be doing about the ongoing chemical exposures.

"There is a lack of concern by the government agencies and the [oil] industry,” She said, "There is a leaning towards wanting to say it is all fixed and let us move on, when it is not. The crude oil is continuing to come onshore in tar mats, balls, and strings."  "So the exposure continues. There is still a large amount of crude in the marshes and buried on the beaches. As long as that pathway is there for exposure, these problems will continue quite a long time into the future.”

Dr Mike Robicheux is a doctor in Louisiana who has been treating scores of people he says are being made sick from BP’s toxic chemicals.

Robicheux says new patients from the exposure are coming into his office daily, and believes that the broader medical community across the Gulf Coast are either unwilling or unable to deal with the crisis.

Robicheux, who has appealed to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for help, said:

"The medical community has shut this down...They either don’t understand or are afraid to deal with it properly because they are afraid of the oil and gas industry."

"This is the biggest public health crisis from a chemical poisoning in the history of this country," Robicheux told Al Jazeera, "We are going to have thousands of people who are extremely sick, and if they aren’t treated, a large number of them are going to die."