Simulation of BP Oil Spill, Day 360, courtesy of University of Hawaii
University of Hawaii scientists Researchers Axel Timmermann and Fabian Schloesser have been trying to answer a question that few will even dare to ask. They want to how not if but when the oil from the Deepwater Horizon oil spill will round the tip of Florida and race up the east coast, polluting beaches and destroying fisheries along the Atlantic seaboard.
Their answer may frighten many. After some serious number crunching and based on historical ocean current movement, they determined that the entire eastern shoreline of the U.S. will see signs of the BP oil spill within the next three months. And a year from he accident — April 20, 2011 — the oil will stretch across the Gulf of Mexico, up the Atlantic and be half way to Europe.
“After one year, about 20 percent of the particles initially released at the Deepwater Horizon location have been transported through the Straits of Florida and into the open Atlantic.” — Axel Timmermann, University of Hawaii at Manoa oceanographer
The School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology Computer Simulation
Disclaimer: The dispersal of the particles does not capture such effects as oil coagulation, formation of tar balls, chemical and microbial degradation. Computed surface concentrations relative to the actual spill may therefore be overestimated. The animation, thus, is not a detailed, specific prediction, but rather a scenario that could help guide research and mitigation efforts.
This simulation is also based on the estimated flow of oil from the spill of 50,000 barrels a day for 150 days.
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