How big is the Deepwater Horizon oil spill?
On April 20th, an explosion on the Deepwater Horizon left 17 workers injured and 11 missing and presumed dead. Oil is spilling from a well 5000 feet below sea level, discharging 200,000 gallons of crude oil a day according to the official estimate (though over 2 million a day, by private estimates).
The spill covers at least 2500 square miles of ocean surface. You can see the extent of the damage here as of May 6th, just southeast of New Orleans.
But how big is the spill, really? It’s hard to get a sense of the true size when it’s over the ocean floor. Use the links below to see how large the spill is.
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More info:
- Oil spill data courtesy of the State of Louisiana, NOAA-NESDIS, and Pete Giencke.
- National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
- Google Crisis Response site, where you can download the data shown here, to view in Google Earth
