What are the biological impacts of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill?

The catastrophic impact, if it is not too much to call it an "extinction catastrophe", will cause a large number of countless marine organisms and species to disappear from the earth as a result of this catastrophe, and the consequences can be described as a serious ...... in space

The Deepwater Horizon, an offshore oil rig leased by BP, sank in the waters of the Gulf of Mexico on April 20, causing the worst oil spill in U.S. history.

After 85 days of continuous oil spill pollution, people have just waited for the long-awaited good news, the new oil control device has successfully covered the underwater oil leak, and "no more ** into the Gulf of Mexico". In the past three months, a lot of efforts have been made by the relevant parties, and various facilities have been launched, but most of them have not achieved good results.

Reinforced concrete cover" - cause of failure: gas hydrate blockage.

In early May, a reinforced concrete hood weighing about 100 tons was lowered into the seabed to cover the oil spill and collect the leaked **. On May 8, BP announced that a large amount of crystalline gas hydrates, mainly methane hydrates, had unexpectedly appeared in the hood, forming a blockage that caused the oil collected in the hood to be unable to be exported.

"Top hat" - the reason for failure: small size and weak ability.

Compared to the reinforced concrete hood, which weighs 100 tons, the oil suction device called the "top hat" is much smaller. However, due to its small size and poor pressure adjustment results, the "top hat" was not able to collect oil spills, and there were constant oil spills, so it was soon shelved again.

"Extinction method" - the reason for the failure: too much pressure on the seabed.

The "extinguishing method" is to inject high-density liquid into the oil pipeline to inhibit the upwelling of the oil pipeline, and then seal the oil leakage point with cement. However, at 1,500 meters underwater, the atmospheric pressure reaches more than 150, which is more than 150 times that of land. Such pressure makes the seabed ** and mud gush continuously, resulting in the failure of the "extinguishing method" equipment to effectively inject high-density liquid, and the plugging of the oil pipe fails.

"Pipe cutting cap method" - Failure reason: The chainsaw is stuck.

The so-called "pipe capping method" refers to sending a diving robot to cut off the damaged oil pipeline at the oil leakage point, and then cover the leaking oil pipeline with a funnel-shaped device, and then suck the ** to the sea surface with the help of a siphon for collection and processing. However, on June 2, when the submersible robot tried to saw off the oil pipe, its chainsaw got stuck and had to stop work.

Top Hat No. 10 – Uncertainty: Hurricanes and Resilience.

The device that successfully controlled the oil leak on the 15th was named "Top Hat No. 10", which was an improved version of the earlier "Top Hat" device. However, BP is not entirely sure of the actual oil control capacity of the new "top hat", especially when a hurricane strikes or other serious natural disasters and the suction ship has to separate from the "top hat", and whether the "top hat" can cover the oil spill on its own.

"Decompression wells" – disadvantages: too long to take.

"Pressure-reducing wells" are considered the most reliable way to completely plug an oil spill. BP began drilling two "decompression wells" near the spill in May, hoping to use the connectivity of the decompression wells to inject concrete and mud to eventually seal the spill permanently. However, it will take about three months to build a "decompression well", which means that the "decompression well" will not be completed until mid-August this year.

The oil spill itself was indeed an accident, and it was also BP's fault to blame. But in the face of the reaction to the oil spill, the United States cannot shirk its responsibility. It was supposed to be a high-risk deep-sea drilling, but as a result, the tubing at a depth of 1,500 meters was torn off, and a large amount of oil was pumped out of the oil fields on the seabed.

It's not very clear, but it must have been an accident, and this well scored very high in the safety assessment, and it seems that the equipment was caused by an employee error.

It's the same as the oil and gas blowouts on land. During normal production, the mud with corresponding gravity is configured according to the normal pressure of the downhole, which plays the role of lubrication and pressure control. However, when there is a sudden change in the pressure in the ground, the extreme pressure can cause damage to the pipeline or wellhead control facilities.

Onshore can also be disposed of by cement, or ignition, etc., while the measures for offshore platforms are much more limited.

At present, there seems to be no investigation results, and it is preliminarily determined that a piece of equipment on one of the drilling platforms used for this oil well has failed!

Six years ago, the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in the United States shocked the world, and the "Deepwater Horizon" oil drilling platform owned by BP Company was a big accident, which not only claimed the lives of many workers, but also caused a leak of 5 million barrels, covering the surrounding 2,500 square kilometers of sea area, and had a huge impact on local marine life, causing immeasurable damage to the ecological environment and marine life, and was called "the most serious marine oil spill in history". IMAX 3D movie "Deep Sea Catastrophe" is based on this incident, restoring the beginning and end of the disaster in an all-round way, and striving to bring you the most realistic "Deep Water Horizon".

The "detonation of the nuclear bomb" lost a huge amount of $61.6 billion, and BP was "greatly damaged".

Regarding "The Deep," based on the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, director Peter Borg said: "The whole point of the film is to tell the public how the oil spill was discovered, and you will find that the process of drilling for oil is like 'detonating a nuclear bomb', and you have to be very careful not to get the oil out of your control." ”

Although it is self-evident that the "oil giant" BP is the main party responsible for the accident, many news reports have pointed out that BP's mistakes led to the "nuclear bomb detonation", and according to the latest news, BP has paid about $61.6 billion in compensation so far. In this astronomical amount, it is the loss of innocent lives, 87 days** leakage and 6 years of ecological disasters, and BP and the Gulf of Mexico ecological environment are all "devastated vitality".

Peter Borg: Objectively present the beginning and end of the disaster so real that it can "deceive the eye".

Peter Borg, the film's director, said: "I wanted the film 'The Deep' to be a clear and interesting way for the audience to learn something, and to show the audience what went wrong, how serious the oil accident was, and how people tried to get out." ”

I have to mention that there are many marine scenes in the film, and because of the great attention to restoring details, there will be fewer scenes presented with special effects in the film than everyone thinks. In this regard, producer Lorenzo said: "The closer it is done to reality, the better it will be, and this can deceive your eyes."

When we were working on Transformers, we used a lot of real scenes. That's why we decided to build the whole set, and a lot of movies were shot without us doing that, and that's what I admire about Lionsgate. ”

The film "The Deep", directed by the famous Hollywood director Peter Borg, features Mark Wahlberg, Dylan O'Brien, Gina Rodriguez, Kurt Russell and John Malkovich. The film is based on real events, shot with IMAX, and restores the most real disaster scene with the top Hollywood special effects.

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Louisiana's 110-kilometer coastline is polluted, severely impacting fisheries and wetland ecology. A large number of fish deaths, including the Gulf of Mexico key protected fish to the United States surrounding the territory of agriculture harm, lack of water, it is difficult to make agricultural development, if not remedied, it is very likely to fail the harvest after the water in the Gulf of Mexico evaporates, the formation of rainfall on both sides of the Atlantic, although the degree of harm is light, but it will still cause the economy, agricultural losses Oil pollution will flow through rivers into the vast area of the United States, causing a large range of pollution, especially along the agricultural provinces will occur various agricultural disasters Britain will also lose a lot of money, The U.S. oil spill will cause widespread deaths along the coast of the country, as the U.S. oil spill will cause widespread deaths along the coast, including turtles, fish, and seabirds, and it is unclear how much contamination will be due to the oil spill that has not yet stopped. Since oil is a mixture of many organic substances with different properties, the main components of which are carbon, hydrogen and oxygen, these elements exist in the form of liquid alkanes, and these substances are easily volatilized into the air, so coastal dwellers everywhere the oil reaches should be careful.

Some alkanes are unstable and will decompose into light alkanes with a relatively small molecular weight, thereby increasing the greenhouse gases in the air, causing the weather to become hotter and hotter, which is the greenhouse effect, and thus the sea level rises, so I won't say what the greenhouse effect is again. In addition, petroleum contains nickel, vanadium, copper, arsenic (arsenic contains arsenic), cadmium (contained in batteries), mercury and other heavy metals, which will denature many species of protein and die, although the amount is very small, but it will accumulate in seafood, this we can refer to Japan's "cadmium rice incident", once the heavy metal reaches a certain level in the human body, the light is disabled, and the heavy one dies. Since oil is "digested internally", this kind of thing is inevitable, and it will not be alleviated until n years later As for entering the circulation, then the affected area will be much larger, and the consequences will be more serious.