As The Fog Cleared

The infamous fog of San Francisco was thick and gray the morning the Cosco Busan cargo ship crashed into the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge. It was Nov. 7, 2007, and within seconds of the crash, 53,000 gallons of fuel oil were released into the surrounding waters. One of the largest oil spills in the history of the San Francisco Bay Area, it set into motion a series of events that ultimately led to a $44.4 million settlement with the companies responsible for the spill (Regal Stone Limited and Fleet Management Limited). $32.3 million of the settlement was earmarked for natural resource restoration projects managed by a trustee council with input from the public.

To the public, this has meant funding for bird, fish and habitat restoration work in the Bay and on outer coasts where impacts from the oil spill were felt. It has also been used to enhance shoreline parks and outdoor recreation in dozens of locations around the Bay Area, helping compensate the public for the lost visits to the beach when oil washed up on the shores.

That first morning in 2007, we didn’t really know how much oil had been spilled — initial reports indicated it was only a small amount. But as the fog lifted, it quickly became apparent that oil was spreading over a large expanse of the Bay. When I got the initial call about the spill, I had just landed in southern California to work on my major project at the time. My coworker on the phone suggested I get back to the Bay Area as soon as possible. For the next several weeks I worked long hours alongside fellow scientists to quickly organize and conduct the field work to evaluate natural resource damages from the Cosco Busan oil spill.

The type of oil that gushed into San Francisco Bay was bunker oil, which is commonly used to propel large ships and is different from crude oil or refined fuels. Bunker fuels are so viscous (thick and slow-moving) that they actually have to be heated to over 100 degrees Celsius (212 degrees Fahrenheit) in order to flow to ship engines.

As the thick bunker oil spread on the waters surrounding San Francisco, it turned into tarry patches and balls that eventually stranded along hundreds of miles of shoreline. Much of our understanding about the toxic effects from oil spills at that time had come from studies of spills of crude oil, such as the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska. But as we studied the effects of bunker oil on fish and wildlife after the Cosco Busan spill, we discovered bunker oil appeared to have different toxicological effects compared to crude oil.

Lingering Effects

Two to three months after the spill, when the huge annual schools of Pacific herring entered San Francisco Bay to find their shallow spawning grounds, most of the shoreline and nearshore evidence of lingering bunker oil was already gone — either cleaned up, dissipated or at least hidden from view. But when we collected herring eggs from shallow areas both affected and unaffected by the spill, we made a remarkable discovery — almost all of the eggs collected from spill locations were dead or deformed. The eggs collected outside of the spill zone were largely normal. This was especially surprising given the lack of significant remaining evidence of bunker oil.

We conducted additional studies over two more seasons of herring spawning in the Bay and eventually concluded that the toxic characteristics of the bunker oil from the Cosco Busan spill affected as much as a quarter of the herring spawning in 2008. We also concluded that the effects didn’t carry over past that first spawning season after the spill. Our studies, directed by scientists from NOAA’s Northwest Fisheries Science Center and the Bodega Marine Laboratory in California, forged new scientific understandings on the effects of oil spills on aquatic resources and have guided further progress on our assessment of present and future spills. In fact, the scientific studies of the effects of the 2007 Cosco Busan oil spill, particularly the magnification of oil toxicity caused by sunlight, set scientists on the path to further groundbreaking investigations during and after the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. In the 10 years since the Cosco Busan spill, we have gained an even better understanding of the mechanisms by which oil exposures lead to cardiac deformities and other adverse effects in developing fish, and in other wildlife.

Next week will mark a full decade since the Cosco Busan oil spill. I’ve reflected on the countless hours of work that led to the settlement of damages: from the emergency responders cleaning up the oiled waters (and the thank-you cards to them from local school kids left on the beach) to the attorneys poring over the maritime and clean water laws violated by the spill. The 2012 settlement set us on the path toward the restoration of the impacts the spill had on San Francisco Bay and the people who recreate around the Bay.

The Damage Assessment and Restoration Plan for the Cosco Busan oil spill provides details on the restoration projects that have been and continue to be implemented; you can review it here

This blog post was written by Greg Baker. Baker works as an environmental scientist in the Assessment and Restoration Division of NOAA’s Office of Response and Restoration and is based in the San Francisco Bay Area.

RESOURCES

To learn more about the Cosco Busan oil spill, you can also visit the resources below:

• Cosco Busan oil spill image gallery
• Making Waves podcast: episode 84 “Cosco Busan Settlement,” and episode 91, “Restoring San Francisco Bay.”
• Related articles:
  • $36.8 Million Settlement to Restore Natural Resources and Improve Recreational Opportunities in Areas Affected by Cosco Busan Oil Spill Will Address Impacts from Ship that Struck the Bay Bridge
  • $44 Million Natural Resource Damage Settlement to Restore San Francisco Bay After Cosco Busan Oil Spill
  • DARRP Team Members Receive Award for Work on Cosco Busan Oil Spill Settlement
  • Buoys Serve as Latest Gardening Tool for Restoring Eelgrass in San Francisco Bay
• California Department Fish and Wildlife
• Damage Assessment, Remediation, and Restoration Program Cosco Busan case page 
• National Transportation Board accident report and presentation

The Initial Call

As Nov. 7 drew closer, I found myself perusing my field notes from the Cosco Busan oil spill and instantly reliving memories as if fresh from a week ago …

I was out of town at an interagency oil spill meeting (Regional Response Team 9) with many colleagues from the U.S. Coast Guard and California’s Office of Oil Spill Prevention and Response (OSPR). According to my notes, it was 9:53 a.m. on Nov. 7, 2007 when I got the first call from the Coast Guard Sector Command Center on Yerba Buena Island. I stepped into the hallway to take the call and everything changed …

From my quickly jotted scribblings I had written “Container ship hit Bay Bridge,” “3’ wide sheen, foggy conditions,” “10 bbls,” “0830 [time of collision] … not actively leaking at 0850” and “100 ft. gash.”

I’d worked enough spills to know not to rely on early spill-volume estimates. The 10 barrels (420 gallons) I had written down in my notes later turned out to be much more. In total, 53,500 gallons of black fuel oil spilled from the 900 foot-long container ship in less than 10 seconds.

Regardless of the reported volume, it was clear that a spill had occurred. It was going to be challenging to see how big the problem might be in low visibility conditions, and it would consume my time for the foreseeable future. I returned to the meeting only long enough to pass a note to a Coast Guard colleague of mine who then joined me in the hallway for numerous follow-up calls with our respective offices before we both headed to the airport for a quick flight home.

Once back in the Bay Area, I joined up with other spill responders at the local Coast Guard Unit and heard that Piers 1, 2 and 3 along the San Francisco waterfront (near the foot of the Bay Bridge) were heavily oiled, Piers 33 and 39 (close to the iconic Fisherman’s Wharf) were “sheening” and showed oil on the seawalls, Alcatraz and Angel Islands were already oiled, and some oil had already gotten beyond the Golden Gate Bridge out to Kirby and Bonita Coves.

Normally we would have been able to conduct overflights of the area to see the extent of the problem pretty quickly, but low visibility continued to hamper any effective aircraft operations until the following day and we were forced to rely on scattered reports from the shorelines and from vessels. Meanwhile, some oiled birds had already been recovered and two oiled wildlife search teams were out looking for more.  

I spoke with my key spill contacts at the National Park Service and the Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary (now the Greater Farallones NMS) and recommended they send representatives to the Incident Command Post (ICP) at Fort Mason Center early the following morning. I also activated a NOAA Scientific Support Team from our offices back in Seattle to join me the next day to help with overflights, trajectory support, shoreline assessments and identifying sensitive resources at risk.

By the end of the first day, I was running on adrenaline, my brain was a whir with an ever-increasing to do list, and I could hardly get to sleep. Early the next morning at Fort Mason Center, the ICP was buzzing with the somewhat orderly frenzy that’s common early in emergency responses. We quickly realized that cellphone coverage at the Fort Mason ICP was challenging at times. We were also outgrowing the small facility and local parking lots. Within a few days we moved to a much larger ICP (an old officer’s club on Treasure Island) that leaked when it rained.

The following weeks were something of a blur of typical response activity (long days, overflights, trajectory estimates, shoreline assessments, cleanup endpoint discussions, etc.) peppered with what seemed like innumerable press conferences, VIP briefings, hearings and then finally interviews for the Coast Guard’s Incident Specific Preparedness Review (ISPR – those are rare!). As it turned out, the spill quickly caught national headlines and seemed to have a reverberating effect in the oil spill response community for years to come.

A Flood of Memories

Looking through my notes, several other memory snippets came flooding back … such as the numerous false reports of oil from the public and a flurry of spill-related legislation that moved through the state in the months that followed.

The spill quickly gained national, and even international, attention — as I recall my Coast Guard friend who was on vacation abroad telling me the spill had made the front page of “Le Monde” in Paris.

The response efforts took on unique tactics, such as the “Jet ski SCAT,” when surf rescue teams on jet skis were trained to investigate and document the degree of oiling along otherwise inaccessible shorelines along the outer coast.

The removal of oil debris took even greater efforts, with teams sometimes having to descend to hard-to-reach places on the shoreline. One such activity, nicknamed “Operation Spider Man,” involved a mountain rescue team with the National Park Service descending to a pocket beach along the Marin Headlands to remove oil debris.

It was a stressful response but it ended up being tactically successful. Our participation from local and port partners in planning for future spills has greatly improved through the Area Contingency Planning process. We’ve also enhanced the way we interact with local governments and the media, and how we manage unaffiliated volunteers. Though this spill caused a great deal of damage, it taught us valuable lessons and we are better prepared for future spills.

Jordan Stout is the senior scientific support coordinator for NOAA’S Emergency Response Division. He is based out of Alameda, California.

View the first blog post, "Remembering Cosco Busan: An Overview of the 2007 Oil Spill" here. 

RESOURCES

To learn more about the Cosco Busan oil spill, you can also visit the resources below:

• Cosco Busan oil spill image gallery
• Making Waves podcast: episode 84 “Cosco Busan Settlement,” and episode 91, “Restoring San Francisco Bay.”
• Related articles:
  • $36.8 Million Settlement to Restore Natural Resources and Improve Recreational Opportunities in Areas Affected by Cosco Busan Oil Spill Will Address Impacts from Ship that Struck the Bay Bridge
  • $44 Million Natural Resource Damage Settlement to Restore San Francisco Bay After Cosco Busan Oil Spill
  • DARRP Team Members Receive Award for Work on Cosco Busan Oil Spill Settlement
  • Buoys Serve as Latest Gardening Tool for Restoring Eelgrass in San Francisco Bay
• California Department Fish and Wildlife
• Damage Assessment, Remediation, and Restoration Program Cosco Busan case page 
• National Transportation Board accident report and presentation

The Spill

In the decade since marine vessel Cosco Busan struck the San Francisco Bay Bridge, our concept of a big oil spill has changed. Compared with the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, which gushed millions of gallons into the Gulf of Mexico, Cosco Busan’s 53,000 gallons seems small. Yet that incident had a major impact on the Bay Area — on both the habitat and the public outlook.

Initial reports were that only 140 gallons were spilled. However, those estimates were quickly revised when it became obvious that more than 50,000 gallons of thick tarry oil were spreading across the Bay. This bunker fuel congealed in the cold water and strong winds and tides swiftly carried it to the bay shorelines and as far as Pacific beaches.  

The closed beaches around the Bay and up the coast brought local and national attention to the spill. Oil was found as far north as Muir Beach, and south as far as Pacifica. Miles of beaches were closed; fishing and crabbing were suspended. An estimated one million user-days were lost.

Bunker fuel proved especially toxic to sea life. Fish and birds were highly impacted, with more than 6,800 dead birds documented, including many marbled murrelets, a threatened species. The timing was bad for herring who spawn at that time of year. Fish embryos are particularly vulnerable to even traces of bunker fuel, developing developmental defects that decimated their numbers in 2008. As the herring are a major food source for salmon and other large fish, and marine mammals as well, more wildlife were affected.

The Outcome

Through the natural resource damage assessment (NRDA) and resulting settlement, the ship’s owners were held accountable for damages incurred. A historic settlement of $44.4 million was reached with the responsible parties to pay civil penalties, reimburse remaining costs of the emergency response, cleanup and damage assessment, and to provide more than $30 million for projects to restore injured natural resources and compensate for lost recreational uses. 

"The repercussions from this oil spill led to many changes in how we prepare for, respond to, and assess effects from such incidents in the Bay Area, the state, and even nationally,” noted Dr. Rob Ricker, branch chief of NOAA’s Assessment and Restoration Division.

What began as a pilot’s blunder in the fog has since led to an improvement in how we respond to and recover from such incidents. Not only that, the Cosco Busan incident raised awareness throughout the Bay Area about protecting local resources and led to significant habitat improvements for birds, aquatic vegetation, fish and shellfish.

For more information on the Cosco Busan oil spill, watch for our upcoming blogs detailing the initial call and the emergency response efforts, the assessment phase, a close-up look at the Greater Farallones National Marine Sanctuary’s response efforts, and a concluding piece on the continued restoration efforts.

Patrise Henkel is a communication specialist with NOAA Fisheries.

RESOURCES

To learn more about the Cosco Busan oil spill, you can also visit the resources below:

• Cosco Busan oil spill image gallery
• Making Waves podcast: episode 84 “Cosco Busan Settlement,” and episode 91, “Restoring San Francisco Bay.”
• Related articles:
  • $36.8 Million Settlement to Restore Natural Resources and Improve Recreational Opportunities in Areas Affected by Cosco Busan Oil Spill Will Address Impacts from Ship that Struck the Bay Bridge
  • $44 Million Natural Resource Damage Settlement to Restore San Francisco Bay After Cosco Busan Oil Spill
  • DARRP Team Members Receive Award for Work on Cosco Busan Oil Spill Settlement
  • Buoys Serve as Latest Gardening Tool for Restoring Eelgrass in San Francisco Bay
• California Department Fish and Wildlife
• Damage Assessment, Remediation, and Restoration Program Cosco Busan case page 
• National Transportation Board accident report and presentation

Michael Greer has devoted his technical skills to NOAA’s Office of Response and Restoration (OR&R) for more than a decade. He graduated from the University of Washington with a Bachelor of Science in geology and has worked at the NOAA Seattle Sand Point campus since 2004 as an employee of Genwest Systems Inc., an information management consulting firm that contracts with NOAA.

For the last several years, Mike has played a major role as part of OR&R’s Spatial Data Branch. Dr. Amy Merten, who heads the group, values Mike’s hard work and creativity, as well as his “even-keeled” approach to problems. Managing large data bases, testing a suite of software tools, creating maps and reports, and providing training and support on NOAA applications such as ERMA and DIVER are all part of the technical work that he does.

Mike is also part of the OR&R Scientific Support Team and provides remote and on-scene help with data management and mapping needs at major oil spills and disasters. He has previously worked on larger incidents such as the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010, the Tank Barge Argo oil spill in Lake Erie in 2015, and the pollution response to hurricane Sandy in 2012. Most recently Mike spent two weeks in Puerto Rico coordinating mapping and information management on the pollution response after the devastation caused by Hurricane Maria — mainly focusing on vessel removal and salvage.

NOAA Regional Operations Branch Chief John Tarpley describes Mike as “a highly valued part of the Scientific Support Team — always dependable, capable and a positive light in what are often chaotic and stressful situations.”

For Mike, the most challenging part of his job is making varied systems, tools and protocols work together to achieve the same goal, as well as the long hours, high pressure and fast deadlines of on-scene response.

Though his job may be challenging at times, Mike’s satisfaction comes from knowing that his work helps local economies by restoring and preventing further damage to property and natural resources from pollution events. He enjoys working with a range of federal, state and local partners at disasters, and the opportunity to experience different parts of the U.S.

Peter Murphy, a colleague of Mike’s at both Genwest and OR&R, appreciates the “positive and proactive approach to his work that makes him an asset to any team,” and his ability to “deliver high quality results for any job, large or small, while working with partners to share information and identify the best solution.”

Ask anyone at OR&R about Mike Greer and you’ll hear not only about his professional abilities, but also his fun and positive attitude that makes it such a joy to work with him!

This year 170 attendees representing 48 different wildlife rehabilitation organizations and primary care facilities across the state participated in the event. This workshop is a regular training and team-building opportunity for OWCN’s members ranging in size from a handful of staff and volunteers to long-established facilities like SeaWorld. All have oil spill training and are prepared to respond, but some have limited experience with actual oil spills.

Oilapalooze included a wide variety of talks on rehab and oil spill-related topics, including "Distribution of Guadalupe Fur Seals (Arctocephalus townsendi) off the California Coast," "Use of Technology for Improving Wildife Recovery during Oil Spills," "Evaluation of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles for Detection of Oiled Wildlife," "Inland Oil Spills: Species Data & Implications for Wildlife Responders," "Predator Consumption of Forage Fish in the California Current" and "Movement Patterns of Oiled Brown Pelicans (Pelecanus occidentalis) Following Rehabilitation."

Attendees also had the opportunity to explore hands-on laboratories on topics ranging from pelagoic bird necropsy and sea otter necropsy, to clinical pathology and sea otter reconaissance. A new series to the workshop this year included hands-on "101" labs to provide cross-training for participants to learn how to work with new species. The "101" labs included terrestrial mammals, terrestrial (non-raptor) birds, raptors, herptiles, passerines and more.

For more information, contact Jordan.Stout@noaa.gov.

According to a press release from the Coast Guard, watchstanders received a mayday call from the captain of the tugboat, Buster Bouchard, at 4:35 a.m. reporting that the barge attached to the vessel had caught fire and two crewmembers were missing.

"In this situation, safety is paramount," said Capt. Jason Smith in the press release, the Sector/Air Station Corpus Christi acting sector commander. "Our first objective is to find the missing crew members, and our immediate second objective is pollution response and ensuring navigational safety in the affected area."

The fire has been extinguished though it is unknown how much of the crude oil cargo has been discharged. The barge was carrying 133,000 barrels (5,586,000 gallons) at the time of the fire.

OR&R is continuing to model the possible trajectory and a pollution boom is being staged to contain any discharged oil. There are initial reports of some oil in the water, but there is no estimate of the amount. As the amount consumed by the fire is still unknown, the uncertainty surrounding numbers will remain high.  

Oil Platform Fire

According to a press release from the U.S. Coast Guard, an oil platform exploded and caught fire in southwestern Lake Pontchartrain on Sunday night. It was estimated that about 500 barrels of South Louisiana crude oil were in tanks on the platform, owned by Clovelly Oil Co., at the time of the explosion, approximately 8 p.m. on Oct. 15. At this time it is unknown how much was burned up in the fire.

The Coast Guard has requested a worst case trajectory for 500 barrels, though a Coast Guard overflight on Oct. 16 detected no sheen in the water, and no oil on the shoreline was visible from the air. The New Orleans/ Baton Rouge National Weather Service is also running air plume modelling.

The fire has since been extinguished and during an overflight on Oct. 16 there were no visible signs of pollution. Tarry residue balls of approximately 0.6 miles in length and 4 feet in width were collected from the shoreline of Jefferson Parish.

Eight platform workers were reportedly aboard when the platform exploded. Seven of the workers were taken to local hospitals, while one person is still missing. The Coast Guard is continuing to search for the missing man both by air and by boat.

The cause of the explosion is still unknown.

Pipeline Discharge

Last week in a separate incident, a pipeline discharge reportedly occurred 40 miles southeast of Venice, Louisiana.

The National Response Center reported the discharge at 1:30 p.m. on Friday, Oct. 13, according to a press release from the U.S. Coast Guard.  

The oil was released in the Gulf of Mexico from infrastructure fully submerged  in water at a depth of 4,463 feet. LLOG Exploration, which operates the pipeline, identified the location of the release as the Mississippi Canyon Block 209, Well No. 1 and estimated that between 7,950 to 9,350 barrels (or 333,900 and 392,700 gallons) were released.

In a press release earlier today, the Coast Guard reported that a panel investigation was initiated on Monday by the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE) Gulf of Mexico Region Director Lars Herbst.

A fracture was reportedly observed in the jumper pipe leading from the well. LLOG reported to BSEE that they isolated the pipeline leak and stopped the it on Thursday morning. The flow through the fracture has since ceased.

A sheen was observed and reported through the National Response Center. Monitoring of the residual sheen continues. No shoreline impacts have been reported

BSEE is coordinating with the U.S. Coast Guard on the response. The Office of Response and Restoration is continuing to provide trajectory modeling and mapping support.

The U.S. Coast Guard contributed to this article.

To detail some of the new technology and practices that have supported hurricane response this season, NOAA recently launched a new hurricane story map.

“History is being made this season. New satellites, modeling tools and other new technology, and a revamped institutional philosophy designed to build a Weather-Ready Nation, amount to a complete change in how NOAA prepares our country and our communities for hurricanes,” said Louis W. Uccellini, director of the National Weather Service, during an interview with The Atlantic.

NOAA’s new and emerging technology, such as a Geostationary Lightning Mapper(GLM), GOES-16’s Advanced Baseline Imager and the experimental HRRRX, a real-time, hourly updated severe weather model, provided more detailed maps and images of these storm systems resulting in earlier warnings and better impact predictions.

These new tools not only helped with forecasting and mapping these storm systems, but also helped in monitoring and responding to possible oil spills and hazardous leaks using applications such as ERMA® (Environmental Response Management Application), a regionally-tailored mapping tool.

Some of NOAA’s new tools this season were also available to the public, including the new Storm Tracker App, where users can follow severe weather storms as they develop.

This hurricane season those affected can also request aerial images collected by NOAA’s National Geodetic Survey to help assess the hurricane-related damage. For hurricanes Harvey and Irma alone, there have been 1.7 billion requests for these images.

For videos, images and more information on the tools and resources NOAA is using this hurricane season, please view the full story map here.

To stay up to date on storm activity, including Tropical Storm Ophelia, check out the new Storm Tracker App here.

“This partnership has allowed vessel recovery activities to continue efficiently with no adverse impact to protected species, sensitive habitats, historic and archaeological resources and tribal resources.”

Through pre-planning and previous experience, OR&R has been able to anticipate the needs of the Hurricanes Irma and Maria response organizations and has had products and services at the ready once the actual response began. OR&R has responded to many hurricane events and is working to ensure that all environmental regulations are followed to help minimize any additional damage that could be caused by response and removal operations. We have developed improved methodologies to use GIS and aerial photogrammetry to pre-identify potential sources of pollution and detrimental debris. 

At this time, OR&R is preparing for yet another potentially damaging hurricane in the Gulf of Mexico. 

For further information on OR&R’s pollution response after hurricanes, see Preparing for What Can Go Wrong Because of Hurricanes (2016), and Oil Spills and Hurricanes Can Take the Nation by Storm (2015).

The EPA describes the Urban Waters Federal Partnership as a program that “reconnects urban communities, particularly those that are overburdened or economically distressed, with their waterways by improving coordination among federal agencies and collaborating with community-led revitalization efforts to improve our Nation's water systems and promote their economic, environmental and social benefits.” There are over 250 locations across the country, and the partnership has improved more than 22,000 acres of land.

NOAA’s Office of Response and Restoration (OR&R) plays a critical part in Urban Waters Federal Partnership team by providing scientific expertise that helps partners achieve improved conditions along waterways in the Northeast. Simeon Hahn, one such member and NOAA OR&R environmental toxicologist, is focused on improvements in the Philadelphia area as well as New Jersey and Delaware. He has also focused on revitalization efforts along the Anacostia River in Washington, D.C., the Petapsco River in Baltimore, and the Brandywine River in Wilmington, Delaware. The work restores degraded waterfronts to revitalize economically depressed areas along the river and improve habitats.

Simeon, who has been a member of the interagency team since the early days of the Urban Waters journey, was described by Surabhi Shah as one whose leadership was essential, especially in launching the Greater Philadelphia Area - Delaware River Watershed. “Simeon and Dave Westerholm have helped communities, federal agencies, and all our other partners better understand the tremendous range of expertise and programs that NOAA brings to the table.”

OR&R Director Dave Westerholm calls the Urban Waters Program a model that demonstrates what can be done when agencies work together with local communities. “Simeon Hahn has been a great example of this collaboration for NOAA and it is appropriate that his work, along with our other partners, has been recognized with this Public Service Award.” 

The non-profit, non-partisan Partnership for Public Service announced the award on September 27, 2017, at its annual gala.

Congratulations to Surabhi Shah and her team!

In addition to scientific support staff in Florida, OR&R now has staff on-scene in Puerto Rico to address any marine debris that may be a source of pollution.

While search and rescue and humanitarian responses are ongoing, the NOAA Marine Debris Program, with other organizations, is gathering critical information, maps and debris reports to start the long process of addressing the non-polluting storm debris. Once impacts are assessed, priority items for removal can be identified and a strategy for removal created.

On the morning of October 2, USCG Admiral Peter Brown visited the Unified Command (UC) in Miami, Florida. While there, he was briefed on various NOAA products being used to provide scientific support for the response to the recent hurricane damage. The Unified Command is responsible for overall management of the Emergency Support Function (ESF10) incident response, and directs incident activities including the development and implementation of all hurricane response activities in Florida.

Several NOAA line offices are supporting the response including Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuaries, the NOAA Marine Debris Program, and the Office of Response and Restoration Emergency Response Division. 

The NOAA case team and its Department of Interior (DOI) counterparts were informed by the U.S. Department of Justice of the bankruptcy proceeding in late 2015. The proceeding stemmed from the unwinding of assets from the Mission Insurance Company, which provided environmental insurance policies to the Linnton Plywood Association. From 1954 to 2001, Linnton owned and operated a plywood manufacturing facility on the west bank of the lower Willamette River in Portland, OR. Activities at the site resulted in releases of hazardous substances to the river.

After being notified of the proceeding by the Department of Justice (DOJ), the NOAA case team promptly developed a natural resource damages claim for ecological losses. The case team used a geo-spatial habitat equivalency analysis to scale injuries from approximately one dozen substances of concern in surface sediments, including poly-chlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), pesticides (e.g., DDT), and poly-aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs). The claim used a "joint and several approach" to liability as set forth in the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act, or CERCLA.

After a period of months, NOAA and DOI were notified by the Department of Justice that a natural resource damages settlement of approximately $2.3M had been achieved. These funds were recently transferred to DOI's Natural Resources Damage Assessment and Restoration account and are now available to the Portland Harbor Natural Resource Trustee Council to conduct assessment and restoration activities and to partially offset unreimbursed damage assessment costs incurred over a period of years. This is the second major bankruptcy settlement for natural resource damages at Portland Harbor. In 2010, the Portland Harbor Natural Resource Trustees received approximately $3.2M in settlement funds from the Smurfit-Stone Container Corporation.

For further information, contact Robert.Neely@noaa.gov.

For more details on this site, see:
Portland Harbor
Portland Harbor Superfund Site Restoration Plan Announced

Led by Senior Scientific Support Coordinator (SSC) Brad Benggio, seven OR&R staff including five in the Environmental Unit, one in the Public Information Office (PIO), and one Safety Officer have been supporting U.S. Coast Guard and EPA field assessment teams who are visiting locations throughout Florida where vessels and debris containing potential pollution sources have washed ashore or sunk as a result of Hurricane Irma. 

The teams are being directed by work the OR&R team is doing in the ICP, including building maps with locations of targets identified through interpretation of aerial photos obtained by NOAA aircraft through NOAA’s National Geodetic Survey (NGS). Informational data packages are being developed for each search grid area. The package includes: aerial imagery, maps, lists of resources at risk, sensitive coral and seagrass habitats, threatened or endangered species, and best management practices to ensure response and salvage activities are carried out in the best interest of the natural environment. The assessment teams use the grid survey packages to guide their assessments which will lead to removal of any potential sources of oil and hazardous materials that could be released into the environment.

See related U.S. Coast Guard press release: Update 3: Unified Command begins removal process for vessels displaced in Florida by Hurricane Irma.

For more information contact Jesse.Stark@noaa.gov. 

Partner agencies, including NOAA, are contributing expertise and experience to the assessment efforts. NOAA's Office of Response and Restoration (OR&R) is providing scientific support and assessment of pollution in the aftermath of the recent hurricanes in Florida and other affected areas.

On September 23, the ESF 10 in Miami distributed a news release detailing the ongoing assessments of the most affected areas to include the ports and waterways of Miami, St. Petersburg, Key West, and Jacksonville, Florida.

Areas of focus are south Florida, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands (USVI). Scientific staff are providing on-scene support in Miami and remote support to Puerto Rico and the USVI. Deployment to Puerto Rico and ​USVI was delayed by the onset of Hurricane Maria. Principal tasks include vessel and hazardous waste identification in marine waters, sensitive habitat and species mapping, and prescribing best practices for environmental protection during vessel and hazmat removal operations. 

OR&R also has had staff working at FEMA headquarters in Washington, D.C. for agency level coordination support and the State Emergency Operations Center in Tallahassee, Florida.

ERMA®, the NOAA Environmental Response Management Application, is an online mapping tool that integrates both static and real-time data. It provides a common operational picture of events for the USCG, NOAA, and other responders. Aerial imagery from NOAA National Geodetic Survey (NGS) flight missions over the affected areas is being added to ERMA Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean ERMA as soon as it is available.

The NOAA Marine Debris Program is supporting recovery efforts by coordinating information being collected on marine debris, including that of grounded or sunk vessels, orphan containers, household hazardous waste, and general structural debris. OR&R is updating the NGS aerial images with vessel and debris identification data, then adding to ERMA. These maps are now complete for the Florida Keys, with Miami-Dade County and USVI survey analyses in progress.

For further information:

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration

NOAA National Hurricane Center

Areas of focus are Florida, where OR&R staff is on-scene and the U.S. Virgin Islands, where OR&R staff is prepared to go on-scene. [Update 09.18.17: Deployment to U.S. Virgin Islands was delayed by Hurricane Maria, which is expected to hit that region mid-week.] Information is being collected on marine debris, including that of grounded vessels.

ERMA^®, the NOAA Environmental Response Management Application, is an online mapping tool that integrates both static and real-time data. Aerial imagery from NOAA National Geodetic Survey (NGS) flight missions over the affected areas is being added to ERMA Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean ERMA as soon as it is available. Additional data and analysis are added to ERMA as requested.

For further information:

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration

NOAA National Hurricane Center

In Texas, in response to pollution in the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey, OR&R has been reducing on-scene staff but continues to provide scientific support remotely and on-scene.

Hurricane Harvey made landfall in in southern Texas on August 25, causing damage in a large area surrounding Corpus Christi, Houston, and Port Arthur. The storm and devastating floods that followed generated numerous oil and chemical spills and large amounts of marine debris in coastal Texas.

OR&R has assembled three Scientific Support teams for Hurricane Irma pollution response while at the same time providing coverage for Hurricane Harvey activities and coverage of the rest of the country for routine operations.

ERMA®, the NOAA Environmental Response Management Application, is an online mapping tool that integrates both static and real-time data. NOAA aerial imagery of the affected areas from NGS flight missions has been added to ERMA Gulf of Mexico as soon as it is available. Additional data and analysis are added to ERMA as requested.

Marine debris data, including potential debris locations, types, and quantities, is being captured in ERMA. OR&R is working with partners as they assess waterway debris from both storms.

For further information:

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration

NOAA National Hurricane Center