Prince William Sound is a sound of the Gulf of Alaska on the south coast of the U.S.
It is located on the east side of the Kenai Peninsula.
On March 24, 1989 the Exxon Valdez oil supertanker operated by Exxon and under the command of Capitan Joseph J. Hazelwood left the port of Valdez bound for Long Beach, CA with over 53 million gallons of oil on board. Shortly after midnight, the Exxon Valdez supertanker collided with Bligh Reef, a very well known navigation hazard which caused the rupture of 8 of it’s 11 cargo tanks and spilled 11 million gallons of crude oil into the waters of Prince William Sound.
Shortly after the oil spill, there was no recovery effort for three days while Exxon searched for clean up equipment.
During those three days millions of gallons of oil began to spread down the coast.
The oil spill spread 470 miles to the southwest, which resulted in the contamination of hundreds of miles of coastline and completely destroyed the ecosystem.
The immediate effects of the spill was a major disaster for mammals and sea life in Prince William Sound.
The deaths of about 250,000 seabirds
2,800 sea otters
approximately 12 river otters
300 harbor seals
approximately 250 bald eagles
up to 22 orcas
and unknown billions of salmon and herring eggs. And even 4 people died from the cleaning process
After the spill, the clean up activity in 1989 included more than 11,000 workers
1,400 vessels
and 80 aircrafts were involved.
According to the International Bird Rescue Research Center – “Washing a sea otter was a very involved process that could take four people over 2 hours to complete, depending on how badly the otter was oiled.
One sea otters by the name of Nyac was moved to a Aquarium in Vancouver
and another by the name of Nuka was moved to Seattle Aquarium, these are the only 2 sea otters remaining from the Exxon Valdez Spill.
Exxon spent over $3.8 billion to clean up the site, and to also compensate the 11,000 residents and pay fines.
The Alaskan court ordered Exxon to pay $5 billion in punitive damages in 1994.
The Exxon Valdez disaster was caused by negligence of its captain, Joseph Hazelwood. He was cleared of felony charges, but convicted of a misdemeanor of negligent discharge of oil, was given a fine of 50,000 dollars, 1,000 hours of community service and of course employment termination with Exxon.
Hazelwood had been drinking during the day, but did not appear intoxicated when he boarded the ship that night. He violated company policy by not being on the bridge during the transit of Valdez Narrows. Instead, it was steered by Third Mate Gregory Cousins, who had been working for 18 hours prior, and could have been impaired by fatigue. As a result, he steered the ship off course to avoid ice, but did not correct in time to avoid grounding on Bligh Reef.
Oil has persisted in surprisingly large quantities years after the Exxon Valdez spill in subsurface reservoirs under coarse intertidal sediments.
This oil was sequestered in conditions where weathering by wave action, light and bacteria was inhibited, and toxicity remained for a decade or more.
Exposure to this oil, in turn, caused additional animal deaths. Salmon, for example, had increased mortality for four years after the spill because incubating eggs had come into contact with toxicity.
Exposure to this oil, in turn, caused additional animal deaths. Salmon, for example, had increased mortality for four years after the spill because incubating eggs had come into contact with toxicity.
Larger marine mammals and ducks suffered ill effects because their prey was contaminated. There is an estimate that shoreline habitats such as mussel beds affected by the spill will take up to 30 years to recover fully.
The food chain had an increased effect of the spill in other insidious ways. Orcas in the sound are affected by bio-accumulation of toxins. 14 of 36 orcas disappeared shortly after the spill.
Slowly with decades of time passing the spill, sea otters once again play in the waters of Alaska’s Prince William Sound, and salmon and some other species have rebounded. But killer whale populations have not recovered, and the huge schools of whirling herring that fed both fishermen and animals have not returned, reminding scientists that nature’s responses are complex and unpredictable.
The NOAA shows a timeline when natural resources were declared officially “recovered”
The most positive results from the disaster involve oil tanker safety. In 1990, the U.S. Congress passed the Oil Pollution Act, requiring a phase-out of single-hulled oil tankers in U.S. waters by 2010
The Act set up a liability fund, toughened spill disaster plans, to avoid another spill that can affect the environment.
