The Gulf of Mexico is home to a wide variety of marine life.
The Atlantic bluefin tuna spawns in these waters.
Sperm whales inhabit the area year round
and whale sharks frequent
the northern Gulf often.
Five of the world's sea turtle species
are found in the Gulf of Mexico
All of these marine creatures
depend on this ocean for survival
Yet there is another species
that depends on something else
something very deep beneath the sea.
Drill Spill Repeat
Four years ago,
The Gulf of Mexico was immeasurably changed.
Fans of oil sheen still
drift along the sea and coastline
We've been continually altering the seascape
in the gulf for many years
Today, the Gulf of Mexico
is a virtual city of oil and gas platforms.
They stretch farther than the eye
can see eclipsing the horizon
Whether the Gulf will ever recover
still remains a mystery
How we got here is not
The flash of power
The gleam of oil
well you know what makes makes your auto run
For millions of years
this source of powers slept
peacefully in the dark recesses of the earth.
Until modern magic
Loosed the liquid energy
from its subterranean prison
gray areas became
Second only to taxes
oil is the greatest revenue
in the US Treasury.
In 1896
the first offshore drilling rigs were
established on the continental shelf
near the coast of Santa Barbara, California
In 1969, Santa Barbara experienced
the worst environmental
disaster of the time
over 2.5 million
gallons of crude oil gushed
into the ocean after a blowout
at an offshore drilling rig.
Over 100 miles of pristine California
beach were littered with oily dead birds and marine animals
After Santa Barbara
the nation was divided into
pro offshore drilling and anti offshare drilling
the debate became so contentious it even became a campaign topic
in the 1988 presidential election.
Little did we know what was
waiting for us just around the corner in March of 1989
The worst oil spill in this nation's history
It took place on Friday,
when a super tanker owned by the Exxon Corporation
hit a reef 25 miles off the port of Valdez
By today 10 million gallons of oil
covered a hundred square miles of ocean.
We all know
that human activities are changing...
In the wake of the Exxon President
HW Bush reacted
to the public outcry and
banned offshore drilling.
That ban was continued by his successor
and lasted for over 15 years.
It wasn't until 2007
in President George W Bush's second term
that he lifted his father's 17-year ban on offshore drilling
We need to take action now to expand domestic oil production.
So today I have issued a memorandum
to lift the excutive prohibition
on oil exploration in OCS
with this action, the excutive branch's restrictions
on this exploration have been cleared away.
Oil means horsepower in a horsepower using world
More power to you.
I'm Bonnie Shoemaker, I'm a PhD physicist
from the California Institute of Technology
I brought my little plane out here in April 2010
to see what I could do to help.
The scientists that I would take out,
they were actually changed
once I took them out there in the plane
and they saw with their own eyes
They were flying over miles
and miles and miles of non-stop oil.
That's when they realized that this is really bad.
We probably have singlehandedly done
the most to force accountability on these guys.
Because I come back from every flight
and I report I've put in 20 NRC reports
The coast guard has to answer.
the gas company has to answer.
So it's like, oh god she flew again Here we go
It was not pretty, what I was showing
even around the BP site.
The Deepwater Horizon
there was extensive sheen contingent leakage into 2012
and I'm not sure that anyone else
was monitoring that.
That cost them a lot of money,
to go out there and fix that.
if nobody bothered to notice it the wouldn't have had to do anything.
So I was not popular
And what's wrong with letting people know the truth.
The people of BP made a commitment to the gulf
and every day since we've worked hard to keep it.
BP has paid over $23 billion
to help people and businesses who are affected
we're paying for all spill related clean up costs.
Today the beaches in the gulf
are open for everyone to enjoy
We're making sure people know that the
Gulf is open for business
The beaches are beautiful the seafood is delicious
last year many areas even reported record tourism seasons
I was born here, I'm still here and so is BP.
We were committed to the Gulf
for everyone who loves it and everyone who calls it home.
I thought leave things commercial fishermen
in Southeast Louisiana is not
as good as those BP commercials
would have you believe.
My shrimp production is down
still down between 40% to 60%
in my area and I've been making a living in Lake bohren myself for 29 years.
working on a boat, I can't do it anymore
My oyster production is down at least 93%
In the last 4 years I might have sold about 1500 sacks
in 4 years.
I used to sell that a week
And 240 million of BP commercials
as a lot of people believe that we're OK. We're not.
People are losing it
because they can't do what they want to do for a living.
So you you get a choice, let's go do something else.
Give you an option, we'l retrain you
I say watcha goin retrain me to be a brain surgeon?
or a cable installer, either one of them sucks
I don't have the education to be a brain surgeon
And I'm not going to install cable
If you you take me and put me in the carpenter field
or in welding, I'm putting somebody else out of a job.
So here comes the domino effect we were telling you about.
Oyster production is like the canary in a mine
Again the canary dies, you in trouble, get outta there
Until we get our oyster population back which filters the water
We're not gonna have a good environment.
Commercial fishermen
You have highs and lows of economics
highs and lows of weather hurricanes
you know, but this man-made
disaster is just lingering, we are still in trouble
The spill has brought
light to a lot
of the issues in the gulf
all of the ancillary businesses
family fisheries, docks, the marinas
The ice houses, the transportation companies
People who provide snacks and groceries to stores.
All of that
is a direct reflection
of what can happen
when things cease
But after oil spill.
You know they shut recreational fishing
they shut commercial fishing
and that just killed everybody
in this part of the world.
It's affected everything
it's affecting every business around
That's how we count out the seasons
It's oyster season and it's crab season
It's crawfish season. You know
and even that we're having
some issues with we've taken it
for granted for so
long that it's it's
a little disconcerting
And it feels different.
How you approach things.
It's affecting my my life and my culture.
This is not a normal situation.
To see what it was like
and to see what it is like today.
My name's Al Sonceri co-owner and president
of T and J Oyster Company
Been in business here for 138 years
and with my brother
We've owned the business
since the mid 1980s
The shucking house has been in operation
since 1921
you'll see today that
there is no one in here,
we'd have 4 people here
6 on that side
and 7 over here
we shuck $120 to 140 sacks of oysters a day
Now it you know
if we do a 3rd of that that's plenty.
We're having to get what we can
that is of higher quality and its limited
We're not going to just sell anything
We're not gonna do it under our brand
we've been doing this 138 years
to do something that's inferior
wouldn't be the right thing to do
for our families business.
Well I used to get very emotional talking about this
but have began to be able to compartmentalize the whole thing
and not think about it as the people
that worked out here
and processed our oysters, we all grew up with.
This cooler used to always be filled up with product
I got a few shells
that we shucked over the last 10 days
Louisiana used to produce
40% of
all the market our
oysters from their public
oyster grounds public grounds
used to produce almost
100% of all seen
and since the oil disaster
those areas had been non productive
more and more processors
like ourselves have gone
out of business and
as time goes on
there's gonna be less of us doing
this because we can't hold out
We haven't received anything
from BP, we've
been able and go through
all those years operation
our families have gone 5 generations
through all those different ups and downs
the wars as the natural disasters
and this man-madedisaster about the
biggest hurdle we've ever had to overcome.
11 men died that day
Don't forget it
Every one of those men they
had families they had wives and parents and children.
And all those families have
been deprived of their loved ones.
Everybody thinks about the long-term
pollution in the Gulf
and it's out there.
But don't forget, we're talking about human lives here.
The industry over and
over and has proven itself
to be exceedingly
irresponsible irresponsibility
includes covering
up how much they pollute
BP did not want
any outside help, and expert
outside help from around
the world was offered
And rejected
And the reason they turned them down
it's because they didn't want
anybody to know
exactly how much
oil was being released
from that explosion.
The reason they didn't want
anybody to know how much
they were polluting is because
the fine and is based
on the amount of pollution
I apologize.
I do not want to live in the country
where any time a citizen
or a corporation does
something that is legitimately wrong.
It is subject to some
sort of political pressure
That is again in my words
Amounts to a shakedown.
Local communities and those
who joined a response team
to help with the cleanup have not recovered.
Their communities have not recovered
Life as they know it has changed indefinitely.
They may never get their lives back
They were letting people swim in the water
Right in front of me dispersants, they were spraying.
and all the animals are trying to get out of the water.
These animals were alive
These suckers were crawling out of the water.
Crabs, mullet, flounder, shrimp
2010 in May
I went to work with BP
and the tragic started in my lift
In the the 3rd week of program I fell out
BAm I had to go get rushed to the emergency room.
I'm puking, throwing up shittin on myself, bleeding out my ass
So he said son, you've been chemically poisoned.
Why don't you have respirators
and suits and tape around your boots and gloves.
and get our contacts
in stuff I said they never never
give us any,
he said. Yeah, I shouldn't be on this war
So I would back Tomas supervised
the pool blood out of me.
Me and my wife a why secondhand
splurge Sarwan back supervisor
What does doctor told me he
told me if I said anything else
I'd be terminated.
In 2000. 11 are supposed
to well by the fall of 2000
the not so sick and it was
a justice. It was all us
coming across those duties nets
and it's in that dispersants
fixed everything touches.
It sticks to the so on
its sticks hands I see
stick to my shoes walking house
and sticking to floor it me inside
And expose my family.
80 90% business was repairs
because mission in Congo trolls
are down turn around over a hole one
they will smile Texas incident drought
down because I no longer handle
he used commercial gear coming
out got from Mexico that's new
a of news used yet found
will touch you know as I don't touch
me, I know it's talks
There's 2 kinds of people,
the ones that get sick and no
one's gonna get so many
different things wrong with
me now. And never
had problems with I've
lost faith in an analysis
system, I think
our government is.
Prostitute in itself.
The people who sell should then
for.
People like myself.
Older people.
We should have been given some
kind of morning they made
victims of victims
I was recovering from a train
and arm that can recover.
There's a human health crisis
raging in the Gulf.
They don't think a lot of people know
they but its traders Gazans
in people who are in very, very sick
is something called Gulf Coast into Rome
that people have in their
so many symptoms
are included in their millions neurological
symptoms rumors memory
loss policy our part an
kidney damage here's skin
damage and skin rashes
years.
Cancer starting to emerge
causes oil to enter the body
more readily correction is
the the solvent opens
up the cell walls
it goes through it. That's
why it breaks up the rail once
it in the body Oriel targets
every organ system the liver
the kidney the heart to the brain
everything the mixture of correction
in oil is highly
toxic, we know this
There have been studies, then
from previous oil spills
particularly the Exxon Valdez
oil spill corrects it 95-27
contains a very toxic
solvent new talks ethanol
it causes internal bleeding
the cleanup workers were suffering
from internal bleeding
hemorrhaging one wing BT choose
to use this toxic
dispersant well first of all, they're
allowed to use it.
Under our current regulations
2 million gallons
of corrective were released.
We're not just talking down oil
spill. We're talking about the
chemical experiment.
It was highly experimental
2 years that by you a
dispersant in this major
oil spill.
This is an industry that
has a track record for running
roughshod over local
and state governments and regulators
And the public.
Most people just aren't aware
how massive of
an enterprise is going
on on the Louisiana coast
and a lot of these pipelines were
meant to be in water and
salt water is very corrosive
So there is, there is
a constant problem with
with leaking pipelines.
So without those wetlands.
You know that that's really what's
necessary for protecting you
know our coastal communities from storm
surge hurricanes.
You know it's now had this stretch
of imagination that we could have a mortal
blow out situation in
the Gulf,
combined with the category 5
hurricane you know washing all
that oil into the short, that's
what keeps me up at night.
BP disaster was
was predictable poorly regulated
industry, you know
maximizing profits cutting
corners taking risks
in some senses, it just happened
to be VP. They're not some
outlier in the industry
The lessons that should have been learned
from the BP disaster have nothing
Dear risky practices
it happen any time you're drilling
in deep water.
In terms of response preparedness
were willfully it unprepared
In fact, we would be
in a similar situation
that we were in 2000
and 10 when it comes to mobilize
in response process is not
a matter of if,
it's a matter of when.
We would like to see them held
fully accountable for causing
the largest man made environmental
disaster in US history
The exploration side,
the industry is moving far
too fast for the response
side and it should be the other
way around. There's also this
absurd honored system
by the industry to report
their own violations the leaks
and suppose that we're finding on a regular
basis. I
played out in vastly
underreported in terms of size
and allowed Tanzania reported are.
The oil and gas industry
is pressuring the federal government
to allow the first step
in offshore drilling in the Atlantic
as soon as possible
This first step known as
seismic air again blasting
not only leads the way for risky
drilling but threatens the survival
of marine species, caught
in the crossfire of these blasts
Seismic air guns towed
by ships and faster
raise in mid blasts
of compressed air into the
ocean mapping the sea floor
for deeply buried pockets
of oil and gas.
The blasts from these air
guns are almost incomprehensible
lout 100,000
times louder than a jet
plane Amgen and powerful
enough to penetrate several
miles deep into the sea
floor the dynamite
like blasts are repeated
every 10 seconds
24 hours a day
3 days to weeks
to even months on end
seismic blasts threaten
not only the hearing of marine
life they threaten their very
survival.
More than half a million people
in coastal communities on the
east coast of the United States
depend on a healthy vibrant
Ocean for their livelihoods seismic
air again blasting will put the
stability of the regional
fisheries and those that
depend on them in jeopardy
Our government is currently
taking steps to open the Atlantic
to offshore drilling in every
single ocean where we have derailed
time and time again
we have spell.
It's scary for me here
that they want put offshore
oil platforms, off the coast
of the Atlantic it is pretty irresponsible
think they're well you know we've learned our
lessons it'll be fine.
If anybody would like to
find out about the
real cost for drilling
offshore they should come see us here
in Louisiana.
When you don't have a life form
a wreath at the reef is dead
The habitats dead I use the
kits ÂŁ10,000 a week
We're down ÂŁ3,000 a week
It's not gonna be pretty light
is they know it will, will
be changed.
Mississippi has seen a 50%
drop in the number
of wetlands along our
coast in a 100
year period.
Any time you move in the oil
and gas will move in America
You then have problems.
You don't have spilled.
At what point are we willing
to say enough.
Democracy is not
a spectator sport.
It sounds sort of rhetorical
and cliched but I've lived
it. I've seen it happen. I've
seen communities come together build
coalitions eyeing that we can work
together and we can break this cycle
On January 20-7
20 4-team trade
Beach North Carolina did
just that this small
community came together
to oppose their mayor's support
for seismic blasting off their
coast citizen after
citizens spoke up and
shared their vision for the.
All we now revealed in here
and say, you know, I have to say
I hope that you will think
again at SATs testing times hard
hats. I want to
have to sell things just first
down steeply Patel might the
them there of players that mean testing
In in the cost of this the incident
to to trade seismic testing
The group also huge residents really
can't see how and I respect
that you offered on its side and the,
but as an elected rappers I believe
through their representatives and I think
people need. It was pretty clear.
Was there they witnessed the
public outcry.
The next week they spoke
for their citizens and unanimously
voted to oppose seismic
blasting.
Resolution Council Eurovision worker
is it poses who does is our mission
and the role the oh.
Really good.
We're gonna start after and
the White House makes sense. There
are many other economically
productive ways that we can
work with our coastline so many
places are heavily dependent on
tourism, which employs
more people. So this is about
dollars and cents.
You know, people need to be thinking about protecting
assets that have.
Our communities,
our oceans our economies
Our future is our choice
Let's not let the wants of the
few outweigh the needs of the
many to your elected officials
stop Atlantic drilling before
it starts joined ICI
a and those have already taken
action and visit W
W W.spilled
repeat.
Politicians that
represent are keen to make
sure that whatever is
going to happen is done
in a manner so that people
are protected.
Because that's what their responsibility is.