Study shows continuing impacts of Deepwater Horizon oil spill
Nine years ago tomorrow—April 20, 2010—crude oil began leaking from the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig into the Gulf of Mexico in what turned out to be the largest marine oil spill in history. A long-term study suggests the oil is still affecting the salt marshes of the Gulf Coast, and reveals the key role that marsh grasses play in the overall recovery of these important coastal wetlands.
Conducting the study was a multi-institutional research team funded in part by the Gulf of Mexico Research Initiative, a 10-year independent program established through a $500 million financial commitment from BP. The team began sampling soon after the spill was finally contained, and continue their work today. Their most-recent article—in Estuaries and Coasts—reports on the first six and a half years of sampling post-spill.
Lead author on the study is John Fleeger, an emeritus professor at LSU. Co-authors are Rita Riggio, Irving Mendelssohn, Qianxin Lin, and Aixin Hou of LSU; David Johnson of William & Mary's Virginia Institute of Marine Science; Donald Deis of Atkins North America; Kevin Carman of the University of Nevada-Reno; Sean Graham of Nicholls State University; and Scott Zengel of Research Planning, Inc.
Johnson, an assistant professor at VIMS and expert in salt marsh invertebrates, says "Our study highlights the crucial role that plants play in the recovery of important links in the Gulf of Mexico's coastal food web." Those links ultimately connect to the fish and shellfish that support the region's economy and culture.
Two plants dominate healthy Gulf Coast salt marshes—the smooth cordgrass Spartina alterniflora and the black needlerush Juncus roemerianus. Also abundant on the marsh surface are single-celled, plant-like organisms that scientists collectively refer to as benthic microalgae, while a suite of small invertebrates—amphipods, copepods, nematodes, snails, worms, and others—swim, hop, and crawl among the grass blades or burrow in the underlying root zone.
The team studied these organisms by measuring their abundance and biomass in heavily oiled, moderately oiled, and oil-free areas of Louisiana's Barataria Bay, using both surface plots and shallow cores. Sampling took place at roughly 6-month intervals between 2011 and 2016.
Much more: https://phys.org/news/2019-04-impacts-deepwater-horizon-oil.amp
Photos of a heavily oiled saltmarsh in Louisiana's Barataria Bay show recovery of the plant community following the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. Credit: Dr. Qianxin Lin.
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It's easy for those of us not in the area to forget- but the effects of this huge spill are still being felt in a vast area and still will be for years to come. 
It is heartbreaking. I used to go fishing in the bayous with my dad back then. The bayous were so alive then. Everything looks dead now.
I was reading about memorials for the workers who died - their families will never forget. But there's also the wildlife and sea creatures, not to mention the plant life, all of which were devastated. No amount of "fines" will bring them back - and yet we have an "EPA" which is currently promoting more offshore drilling! The insult to the inhabitants and the environment of the region totally boggles the mind! 
