(this was littered sporadically in the water)

We spent our vacation this year in the same place we’ve been going for the past 5 years, Gulf Shores, Alabama. It’s approximately an hour away from Pensacola, Florida and shares the same shoreline.

We knew about the oil spill. We monitored the beaches via the Real Estate agencies daily updates. We knew it would be a different environment with how the oil was affecting the beaches. No oil had made it to the shores until 2 days prior to us leaving. We still were convinced we’d make the best of our trip.

It was shocking to see how the local economy has suffered immense losses. It was the middle of June – the peak vacation season – you’d expect to see tourists galore.

Nope.

The streets were quite empty. The beaches looked like it was May or even late August. Tourists were there – but in astronomically low numbers. Such a horrible thing to see.

Then there was the oil (clearing my throat) – I mean tar balls.

The first day we were there – no one was in the water. When we walked along the shore we had to watch every step we took – otherwise we’d be scrubbing the oil off of our feet. The oil was in the water like sea weed. The tar balls were everywhere along the shore line. Large and small.

I’m told by the locals, and by watching the local new that the oil (slick) spill migrates daily depending on the tide and the weather. One minute it’s their, the next day it’s gone. So they are taking it one day at a time.

The so-called removal was non-existent. On the major beach in town there were tents and orange vested workers, but on the other shores they were nowhere to be found. The beach we stayed at – we didn’t see any removal teams until the morning we were leaving for the airport.

It’s heart breaking to think of the impact. We watched a local news special that spoke to a local restaurant merchant in regards to the economic impact of the oil spill. It was stated that this time last year their income was roughly $15,000/ week and now they are down to $1500 / week. Employees have been laid off, fired, and the current employees are getting maybe 2 days a week of shift work.

I haven’t even touched on the wildlife and ecosystem. We were lucky enough not to see any of that horrible damage. Lucky I say.

It really stinks because this very shore just recovered from Hurricane Ivan (2004 I think) and now they are being slapped with this. This oil spill is much worse than any hurricane imaginable because of its slow-death. I mean we’re over 2 months into this tragedy?

I found these statistics while surfing the interwebs. Here are some interesting statistics in regards to BP’s failure to act.

The Mississippi River pours as much water into the Gulf of Mexico in 38 seconds as the BP oil leak has done in two months.

For every gallon of oil that BP’s well has gushed into the Gulf of Mexico, there is more than 5 billion gallons of water already in it.

The amount of oil spilled so far could only fill the cavernous New Orleans Superdome about one-seventh of the way up.

If you put the oil in gallon milk jugs and lined them up, they would stretch about 10,800 miles. That’s a roundtrip from the Gulf to London.

BP has spent more than $54.8 million lobbying federal officials in Washington since 2000; that’s about 44 cents for every gallon of oil it has spilled.

Take the 125 million gallons of oil spilled in the Gulf and convert it to gasoline, which is what Americans mostly use it for. That produces 58 million gallons of gas – the amount American drivers burn every three hours and 41 minutes.

If all the oil spilled were divided up and equal amounts given to every American, we would all get about four soda cans full of crude oil that no one really wants.

The gulf oil spill by numbers we can understand « Bits and Pieces

And we continue to watch and wait.