A Collection of Information relating to the BP Oil Spill in the Gulf of Mexico
on June 18, 2010 at 9:56 amThis is the kind of disaster environmentalists and oil companies alike have always known was possible and have always feared. While Oil companies traditionally have used PR to downplay the probability of such a tragedy, environmentalists have long warned of the possible (and very real) dangers to the environment from such an incident. For such a thing to occur in as rich and unique an environment as the Gulf of Mexico is a tragedy which is truly hard to fathom for most of us. Scientific research and historical evidence show that even with the best possible clean up attempts using the latest technology and billions of financial resources, the human race is out of it’s depth in dealing with this accident. The best we can do is mitigate the damage in the short term using the tools we have.
Below is the start of a collection of data to help us understand what has happened and possibly how we may prevent such a thing from happening in the future.
In Keeping with the purpose of this blog in examining the state of the technology in the field of underwater robotics it is clear that this technology is very much a boon to nature and humanity in it’s unique ability to safely, reliably, and cost effectively plumb the depths to further our knowledge and understanding of our ocean eco-system.
-Kmax, 2010-6-18
http://mw1.google.com/mw-earth-vectordb/disaster/gulf_oil_spill/gulf_oil_map.html
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=43846
http://www.universetoday.com/2010/05/05/latest-satellite-images-of-oil-spill/
http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/oilspill/index.html
http://www.geoplatform.gov/gulfresponse/
http://www.contros.eu/index.php