BACKGROUND The 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster led to the largest ever marine oil spill. Individuals who worked on the spill were exposed to toxicants and stressors that could lead to adverse effects. OBJECTIVES The GuLF STUDY was designed to investigate relationships between oil spill exposures and multiple potential physical and mental health effects. METHODS Participants were recruited b...

Satellite synthetic aperture radar (SAR) is frequently used during oil spill response efforts to identify oil slick extent, but suffers from the major disadvantages of potential long latency between when a spill occurs and when a satellite can image the site and an inability to continuously track the spill as it develops. We show using data acquired with the Uninhabited Aerial Vehicle SAR (UAVS...

Renewed political and commercial interest in the resources of the Arctic, the reduction in the extent and thickness of sea ice, and the recent failings that led to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, have prompted industry and its regulatory agencies, governments, local communities and NGOs to look at all aspects of Arctic oil spill countermeasures with fresh eyes. This paper provides an overview ...

Lagrangian trajectory models have been demonstrated to be a useful tool in oil spill response. Despite the improvements in this kind of models, surface drift prediction remains a difficult task plagued with uncertainties. This work presents a Stochastic Lagrangian Trajectory Model (SLTM) that quantifies the uncertainties in trajectory simulations and defines the most likely search area of possi...

The BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Disaster was the most catastrophic offshore oil spill in U.S. history, yet we still have a poor understanding of how organisms could evolve in response to the toxic effects of crude oil. This study offers a rare analysis of how fitness-related traits could evolve rapidly in response to crude oil toxicity. We examined evolutionary responses of populations of the comm...

OBJECTIVES This study presents a scientific basis for the establishment of an environmental health contingency plan for dealing with accidental coastal oil spills and suggests some strategies for use in an environmental health emergency. METHODS We reviewed the existing literature, and analyzed the various fundamental factors involved in response strategies for oil spill. Our analysis include...

One hundred twenty-five commercial fishers in Cordova, Alaska, completed a mailed survey regarding current mental health functioning 6 years after the Exxon Valdez oil spill. Economic and social impacts of the oil spill and coping and psychological functioning (modified Coping Strategies Scales, Symptom Checklist 90-R) were measured. Multiple regression was used to test the utility of the Conse...

Early detection of oil spill events is the key to environmental protection and disaster management. Current technology lacks the sensitivity and specificity in detecting the early onset of a small-scale oil spill event. Based on an infrared oil-water contrast model recently developed, we propose a novel nonscanning computational infrared sensor that has the potential to achieve unprecedented de...

After the grounding of the Exxon Valdez and its subsequent oil spill, all parties with interests in Prince William Sound (PWS) were eager to prevent another major pollution event. While they implemented several measures to reduce the risk of an oil spill, the stakeholders disagreed about the effectiveness of these measures and the potential effectiveness of further proposed measures. They forme...