BP oil disaster – Impact on sea turtles

British Petroleum (BP), one of biggest oil majors of the world lost its credibility earlier this year for practicing unsafely oil drilling procedures. Its mega operation in Gulf of Mexico came to a standstill in April 2010, when leakages happened in its deepwater horizon drilling unit leading to catastrophic explosion. This oil explosion is considered as the biggest one till date killing thousands of sea creatures. The prominent victim has been the already endangered sea turtles.

Sea turtles live in a large numbers in and around the Gulf of Mexico. Every year, the most special variety of sea turtles - The Kemp’s Ridleys arrive at the shores for mass breeding behavior called arribada to lay eggs. Kemp Ridley numbers have greatly decreased over years owing to high sea pollution and hunting.

The recent oil spill has spread hundreds of miles across Gulf of Mexico forming a dense layer over the ocean. This blocks sunlight and air from entering into water. Sea turtles often coming up to the surface for breathing has been seriously affected due to this. Sunlight cannot penetrate this layer of oil leading to hypothermia conditions where temperature drops below survival point.

BP has been severely criticized for controlled burns – a practice of burning the oil spills as a cleanup action. Many sea turtles have been caught in the oil traps and burning oil spill ignites the sea turtles alive. This was realized late and a lawsuit was filed against BP to stop controlled burns. After much persuasion, BP has now accepted to manually release the turtles out of oil trap before burning.

Nesting sites covered with oil have a serious impact on reproduction of sea turtles. Sea turtles have now become prone to indigestion due to oil contaminated foods. Also newly hatched sea turtles find it difficult to survive in the oil polluted ocean water. In addition to this, thousands of gallons of ‘dispersants’ have been added in Gulf to break the oil spills. These chemical dispersants have proved to be lethal to the young sea turtles. Coast guards and many NGOs have been playing vital role in saving the sea turtles from oil spill.

BP is now facing nearly $20bn loss and a series of lawsuits due to this oil spill. It is said that the coastal areas around the Gulf of Mexico has been irreparably damaged and not fit for sea creatures to live in.