5/24/2023 0 Comments The spill zone![]() ![]() So they can’t swim down to the bottom to avoid predators. But it also makes the habitat unavailable, it’s like a false bottom. “What happens when you have no oxygen on the bottom, first of all it kills all the critters that can’t swim away: Worms, crabs in the sediment. SOUNDBITE: MIKE ROMAN, LAB DIRECTOR, UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND CENTER FOR ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE SCIENTISTS HAVE BEEN CONCERNED THAT, IF THIS OCCURED IN MASS QUANTITIES AS A SERIOUS CONSEQUENCE OF THE OIL SPILL, IT COULD CREATE HYPOXIC OR ‘DEAD ZONES’ OF LOW OXYGEN IN THE WATER. WHEN THE BP OIL SPILL IN THE GULF OF MEXICO BEGAN IN APRIL, NATURALLY OCCURRING MICROBES BEGAN THEIR WORK, GOBBLING UP SOME OF THE OIL WHEN THE MICROBES DIE, OXYGEN IN THE WATER IS USED UP AS THEY DECOMPOSE. ![]() ![]() National Geographic Magazine on the Gulf Oil Spill © 2010 National Geographic partially funded by NSF field producing and videography by Fritz Faerber Now scientists are using years of dead-zone data to determine whether the dangerous region grew after the spill. ![]() Microbes consuming oil from the Gulf of Mexico's BP spill deplete oxygen levels when they die, raising the threat of an expanded "dead zone," which endangers some marine life. ![]()
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