Gulf Oil Spill by the Numbers

While it is certainly depressing to hear these numbers, the statistics below illustrate the breadth of the oil spill in the gulf. Working at a safety supply company and dealing with all the vendors we have, I can appreciate just how many safety supplies and spill control items are being diverted for this cause.

These numbers are provided courtesy of Industrial Safety and Hygiene News.

• The administration has authorized the deployment of 17,500 National Guard troops from Gulf Coast states to respond to this crisis; currently, 1,640 are active.
• Approximately 37,000 personnel are currently responding to protect the shoreline and wildlife and cleanup vital coastlines.
• More than 6,200 vessels are currently responding on site, including skimmers, tugs, barges, and recovery vessels to assist in containment and cleanup efforts - in addition to dozens of aircraft, remotely operated vehicles, and multiple mobile offshore drilling units.
• Approximately 2.6 million feet of containment boom and 4.24 million feet of sorbent boom have been deployed to contain the spill—and approximately 850,000 feet of containment boom and 2.26 million feet of sorbent boom are available.
• Approximately 25.6 million gallons of an oil-water mix have been recovered.
• Approximately 1.48 million gallons of total dispersant have been applied – 977,000 on the surface and 502,000 subsea. More than 422,000 gallons are available.
• 275 controlled burns have been conducted, efficiently removing a total of more than 10 million gallons of oil from the open water in an effort to protect shoreline and wildlife. Because calculations on the volume of oil burned can take more than 48 hours, the reported total volume may not reflect the most recent controlled burns.
• 17 staging areas are in place to protect sensitive shorelines.
• Approximately 179 miles of Gulf Coast shoreline is currently oiled – approximately 34 miles in Louisiana, 42 miles in Mississippi, 42 miles in Alabama, and 61 miles in Florida. These numbers reflect a daily snapshot of shoreline currently experiencing impacts from oil so that planning and field operations can more quickly respond to new impacts; they do not include cumulative impacts to date, or shoreline that has already been cleared.
• Approximately 78,600 square miles of Gulf of Mexico federal waters remain closed to fishing in order to balance economic and public health concerns. More than 67% remain open.
• To date, the administration has leveraged assets and skills from numerous foreign countries and international organizations as part of this historic, all-hands-on-deck response, including Canada, Germany, Mexico, Netherlands, Norway, the United Nations’ International Maritime Organization and the European Union’s Monitoring and Information Centre.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 30th, 2010 at 7:45 am and is filed under Safety Articles. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.