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Oil Spill Information There was minimal oil on our beaches, but crews have spent months giving our beaches a deep cleaning, including sifting sand several feet deep to make sure it is all gone. The waterways have been beautiful all Fall. Sea birds, dolphin and other wildlife are abundant. Our November and December ASA Class Trips saw huge pods of dolphin. All of our inland cruising waters are currently clear and navigable to the East and West. Gulf sailing is open. We have active bareboat charter and class operations. Those of us in West Florida feel like we really dodged a bullet with this one. We no longer take the natural beauty and the abundance of wildlife around us for granted. Let’s all continue to wish for the best possible outcome for the folks in and around Louisiana’s marshes and fisheries. We will update this message as often as possible. We are operating out of Seville Harbor and Bahia Mar marinas as normal. Our office is open at Seville Harbor. Call us at 850 432-3199 if you have questions, or.... If you want “oil news that you can use” and a way to keep tabs for yourself, we recommend that you check the following web pages on the Pensacola Visitor Center sites: www.visitpensacola.com A good place for current updates and recent photos of our area and attractions. SCIENTISTS SAY 75% OF THE OIL IS GONE AND THE REMAINING OIL HARD TO FIND. This is an excerpt from a NOAA report: “Dispersion increases the likelihood that the oil will be biodegraded, both in the water column and at the surface. While there is more analysis to be done to quantify the rate of biodegradation in the Gulf, early observations and preliminary research results from a number of scientists show that the oil from the BP Deepwater Horizon spill is biodegrading quickly. Scientists from NOAA, EPA, DOE, and academic scientists are working to calculate more precise estimates of this rate. It is well known that bacteria that break down the dispersed and weathered surface oil are abundant in the Gulf of Mexico in large part because of the warm water, the favorable nutrient and oxygen levels, and the fact that oil enters the Gulf of Mexico through natural seeps regularly. Residual oil is also degraded and weathered by a number of physical and biological processes. Microbes consume the oil, and wave action, sun, currents and continued evaporation and dissolution continue to break down the residual oil in the water and on shorelines.”
Scientists have been following the dolphins seen here in Perdido Bay and other nearby inland waters. They have found a healthy population with normal socialization and eating habits and they are fairly confident in the dolphins’ long term well being. |
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Telephone: 850 432-3199 Electronic Mail: |
