| Staring Down the Dragon on Dependence Day: Flying Over the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill in the Gulf of Mexico |
| Monday, 12 July 2010 | Guest Contributor | Blog Entry |
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Our small Cessna traced the coast of Louisiana and Mississippi, documenting the flow of oil and tar balls onto islands, wetlands, mangroves and beaches—and the inadequacy of the bright yellow and orange booms floating here and there and, more often than not, beach-cast and twisted by the wind and waves. One member of our team was a government geologist studying the weathering of oil on seawater. Another, an environmental toxicologist. Our pilot, a NASA scientist. And myself, a marine biologist in search of sea turtles. Bonny, our pilot, skillfully skirted the edges of thunderclouds and positioned our plane wherever we wanted it. Down the oily coast we flew. Timbalier and Cat Islands, Grand Isle, the Mississippi River Delta, Chandeleur Islands. None of these places, and so many others, will be themselves again for a long time.
We flew further offshore. Closer to "ground zero," the site of the oil gusher and location of the ill-fated BP oil platform, Deepwater Horizon.
Then we descended a bit and flew over the Deepwater Horizon site. A new platform has taken its place. A large flame of burning methane jetting from the side. Ships worked the waters all around. Bands of oil extended off into the distance, set off by the deep blue of the Gulf of Mexico.
I thought of the tragic loss of human lives that occurred just below me ten weeks prior. I thought of the massive loss of animal life that's already happened and will continue to unfold throughout this ocean for years to come. I thought of the distraught fisherman who took his own life. I thought of the people below, working to stop the flow of oil and working to burn the oil on the surface. I thought about my daughters. I thought ten million other things at the same time. I felt like I was going to cry. Somehow I didn't, but inside I raged silently. Eventually, I could hold my breath no longer and I sucked in the breath of the fire dragon once again. I will think of the Deepwater Horizon every time I smell that smell. Every time I pump gas into my tank, or ride my bike behind a truck on a busy street. At airports and bus stops. At BP, Exxon and Chevron stations. It will keep me going in this ocean revolution, our collective effort to slay the dragon. Additional resources: Video from the helicopter flight (the added song is a traditional sea turtle chant by elder Alfonso Burgos of the Seri/Comca'ac tribe):
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On the night of the Fourth of July, I flew into New Orleans and watched as fireworks sailed from below into the sky to celebrate Independence Day. A few hours later I was back in the sky, this time flying above a different kind of fireworks. The kind that mourn our dependence.
Then we turned offshore, for deeper seas—beneath us muddy water, oily water and oily, muddy water. Then the edge, a giant convergence, between deep blue and shallower oily water for as far as we could see. There we found a school of forty cownose mantas, searching for food, traveling together. Without a doubt they have all eaten oil.
I've spent my adult life working for the ocean, the endangered animals living in it and the people who depend on it. I've seen the wholesale destruction of species by commercial fishing, illegal hunting and the destruction caused by plastic pollution. But none of that prepared me for this. Our plane surveyed a path of the thousands of square miles of destroyed ocean habitat.
We were close. So close I could smell it. The cockpit filled with fumes. I breathed in the foul breath of the fire dragon. We buzzed the beast, like a pesky fly. Our small craft banked and circled back around for a closer look. This time I held my breath.
Wallace "J." Nichols, PhD is one of the world’s leading 
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