Creolefish in the deepwater habitat of the Flower Banks National Marine Sanctuary, now at risk from the oil spill
As a professor in the oceanography department at Texas A&M, Steven DiMarco has spent years studying the waters threatened by the Deepwater Horizon. "I can't tell you how many times I've thrown up on a boat in the Gulf of Mexico," he says.
DiMarco may soon have some more he can't tell you -- because the federal government might not let him. In the very early morning hours of June 14, DiMarco and 10 scientists will head out from the Texas coast on the RV Manta dive boat -- a 77-foot catamaran owned by NOAA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. And that's where the problem comes in.
DiMarco's team wants to take as many samples and collect as much information as they can about conditions in the Gulf of Mexico, including oxygen levels in the water. DiMarco specializes in hypoxia, meaning the science of what happens when lifeforms haven't got enough oxygen. Whenever there's oil in the water, naturally occurring bacteria swoop in to eat that oil -- and in the process deprive the rest of the ecosystem of oxygen. Scientists worry that rapidly blooming, overfed bacteria could turn sections of the Gulf of Mexico into dead zones, completely anoxic regions where there's very, very little for living things to breathe.
Whatever the group from Texas A&M finds, you might not hear about for an awfully long time. "I'm essentially being told that the data I'm collecting on my hypoxia cruise may or may not be subject to quarantine," DiMarco says. "Which means that we will not be able to publish it, pending the liability litigation. Oh, yeah, 20 years from now, we may be able to publish it."
The professor checked in with us on his way to a conference of marine scientists in Baton Rouge, led by the Consortium for Ocean Leadership. DiMarco says he intends to bring up the government embargo on research, since sharing data and reviewing other researchers' work is the lifeblood of scientific inquiry.
Without a clear guarantee that scientists can freely share what they're learning, DiMarco faces the prospect of going to sea, learning the effects of the Deepwater Horizon spill, and being absolutely muzzled. In theory, he and the others could venture out and discover patches of the Gulf that have been emptied of oxygen -- and not be able to tell anyone. "That's the nightmare scenario," he says. You want to be able to get out there and report back immediately."
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I am Jack's complete lack of surprise.
1984?
The cover-up begins...
Music Maestro Please!
♫♥♥♫♪♥ ♥♫♪ ♪♫♫♪♥ ♥♫♪♪♫♥♥♫♪♥ ♥♫♪ ♪♫♥♫♪♥♥♫♪
I would check with someone like Turley on this. I doubt that this is gratuitous censorship. My guess is that this is government funded research. There might be clear and compelling case law.
I wonder if there's a positive reason for an information quarantine? Not as much a cover-up as preempting some dingbat from screaming the sky is falling by reporting ambiguous data to an audience who doesn't really understand it (save for the fact that it must be the end of the world.)
Right, that's what Americans do when they get negative data - run in circles, scream and shout, then go hide under their beds. Grow up! Stop basing your opinions on the American public based on bad Hollywood disaster movies. Data isn't suppressed because people might not understand what it means, it gets suppressed because people will understand EXACTLY what it means.
Jaimie, the audience is other scientists and anyone else. A scientist can take the raw data and apply it to other studies of the region.
This is gagging our understanding of the real impact on so many levels. This is not progress.
Afraid I agree with LarryD.
Swing and a miss....
So do I. Just how "ambiguous" can this data going to be, anyway--especially now since BP is abandoning efforts to cap this gusher. This oil spill has already done irreparable damage to a fragile ecosystem; that is obvious. By the time the relief well is functioning, the devastation will be unspeakable.
Correction on the above: Just how "ambiguous" can this data be, anyway...
Could it be that the usual cut throat competition over publishing first has some NOAA bureaucrat with the power since they are funding the data collection wanting to make sure his report using the data is published first?
People who hire people to produce data they need control and use the data for their publications all the the time. There is not much glory in publishing something second, in fact, nobody is that interested in publishing something already published.
No need for an evil conspiracy to hide data, just the usual it's my data and I willl get the glory of revealing it.
This guy knows he is sitting on some red hot information and publishing it would make him famous, so of course he is complaining to the media and getting all the attention he can. He is no different from the people he is complaining about, except they paid the bills and made it happen.
Scientific research should be public. All too often, results have been controlled by corporations. This has to stop. Even when corporations, like BP, ante up $500M to study the effects of oil spills (so they'll know how to better hide the spills in the future I expect), that doesn't give them the right to manipulate the scientific results, as corporations have done for years! What college isn't propped up by oil, chemical and other large multi-national money. This is as complicated and problematic as campaign finance reform. Enough! ONE EARTH or bring back the shuttle program and let's find another habitable planet!
ABSOLUTELY UNBELIEVABLE!!! Valuable information covered up when we need it most! Why am I not surprised?
Why? What are you going to do with this information? Use it to condemn Dick Cheney on some message board?
Jamie, you are now on record as supporting the suppression of vital information, for fear it might be used in partisan politics. Are you sure that's a position you want to be associated with?
I believe my point is why do *you* need to know? Your answer to that will be my answer to why this information may be suppressed...
"Why? What are you going to do with this information? Use it to condemn Dick Cheney on some message board?"
I don't think it is needed, but thanks for reminding how Bush and Cheney let the oil industry do whatever they wanted for the last 8 years and President Obama has had only one year to prevent yet another disaster Bush and Cheney left us.
BTW - it was Halliburtian who was "sealing" the well when it failed and started leaking.
I guess I am attacking Dick Cheney on a message board. Didn't need anything but what we already know. Attacking Bush and Cheney is too easy, there are so many facts around. Really, we just want to forget them and that nightmare.
Ed...attacking Bush and Cheney may be too easy, but its not like they have ever been charged with anything meaningful. And that I blame Obama for. Their administration was unparalelled in its corruption, criminality, and contempt for rule of law. Interesting term that "rule of law." It was so popular during the Clinton administration, they impeached him with it. Then during the Bush years it silently disappeared from the lexicon. We are going to having all many of foul harvests for years because of them. Twenty and thirty and more years from now facts will be coming to light that completely revise what we think we know about political depravity and malfeasance. War crimes and governmental subversion would be good places to start.
What if he shares it anyway?
If the court gags anyone, and that person shares anyway, imprisonment can follow.
Another Texas A&M professor, Mark Olsen is taking samples. But he's asking volunteers to send them in from all over the Gulf.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/37370575/ns/local_news-corpus_christi_tx/
Here's the project's Facebook page.
I don't see how they can stop everyone from taking water samples and collecting data.
One thing you can be sure. When he IS able to publish his data, it won't be a surprise.
What does it matter who is funding the research or even if the research team is being prevented from reporting by the government. On such important issues what matters most most is life. The life of the sea creatures and of humans. If it is affecting either one then it needs to be reported to other researchers, the media, humanity, and all other countries of the world so they can investigate if it is happening in their oceans.
This is another tragedy closely related to the oil spill in the gulf. How do we know it isn't an on going spill by oil companies in that region?
This is really discouraging because it's so beautiful. To even think of losing this leaves a cold lump in my stomach.
Does anyone know what that white thing is that looks like a piece of clothesline? It appears to be anchored in place but the other end looks like it is free to move around. God there are so many interesting things that may die before we ever get a chance to know anything about them. Damn you, BP.
I'm with you on this. Okay, so BP can be charged for the death of endangered birds. Good. But what about the destruction of a deep water reef? It makes me contemplate the just application of violence in this case, so I guess I'm better off not saying anything. Life imprisonment for BP would be getting off light.
The oil industry seems to be able to avoid and buy their way out of obeying regulations requiring safe practices. Just fill the regulatory agency's with people who used to work for you and people who will be working for you and you have no problems whatever the law says.
Putting BP into bankruptcy might be the best thing for the people of the world.
Bankruptcy when something happens will get their attention and make the jerks give a damn.
This is just one example of how our elect and elite have allowed our natural resources to be plundered, which is one of the reasons our forefathers wrote the 'Declaration of Independence. When our forefathers wrote our constitution they held the ideas of Beauty, Equality, Goodness, Justice, Liberty, and Truth, and there within lies the problem with the state of America. The language they used to write the laws of this nation was one that every person with the most elementary education would be able to understand, no wunder my first amendment right written to the editor of ' Summit County Bee' on may 22, 2009, fell upon deaf ears, I used the words of Thomas Jefferson, simple. Rethink your paradigm of money and enact some form of the 'Seasachthiea laws' of lawmaker Solon and the 'Indemnification Payments' that Thomas Paine wrote about in his pamphlet 'Rights of Man'. Human nature hasn't changed, only technology, now that's scary. Just about every pitfall our forefathers warned us about we have fallen into. Even Alex De Tocqueville, in his "Democracy in America", warned us. Now I'm ranting. Words falling upon deaf ears again, anyway. Peace Out
You speak fluent Teabaggerism
Why, because he invoked Jefferson? Because he advocates back-to-basics Constitutionalism? Because he misspelled "wunder"? Most teabaggers aren't even aware of Tocqueville. I don't agree with his post, but let's not start bandying the "teabagger" epithet at anyone and everyone with a different point of view.
I side with Thomas Paine, TYVM. It seems you side with the red or the blue; Dumbos or Jackasses. Go read some Hegel, Kant, or Hume without paying someone to tell you what to think, in other words think for yourself. If you get bored i could show you the true meaning of teabagger, you hate-full duck. Your just like a lot of the elect and elite who argue for the sake of arguing and not for resolution.
It is time to drag out the Oil Barons Dick and George.......and let them handle this disaster as only those two can. They would be able to see through deception because they have first hand experience ....their connections and oil industry buddies can bring the necessary pressure to bare on BP that only those two have ......bring them out in front of the cameras ....send them to the Gulf....lets get this problem solved by the best!!!!!!
Aye! Hear hear!!!
I surely do hope he refuses to go on that trip and, instead, is able to find some funding for him and team to go do some independent research. While I realize there may be places off-limits out there, they should be able to get some solid data without needing the government's help.
That being typed, this is a disgusting move by the gov't. I thought Obama was all about transparency? Or is that only when it suits his purposes?
Wingnuts, before you post here.
Note that OBAMAHATE is not a substitute
for facts and truth.
The vast majority of people posting here
have taken the time to educate themselves
on both.
You're wasting your time and diminishing
your credibility when you come here merely
to show off how many ways you can be
hateful. You don't impress the majority
and you certainly don't do your cause --
if you have one -- any justice.
SORRY, 'baggers.. (not really);
And not all criticism of President Obama is hateful or made by 'wingnuts' and 'teabaggers,' Nancy. Some of us on the left are very disappointed with the failures of transparency and clear action in this administration, and the hesitancy to do whatever is necessary to get this massive problem fixed is one such failure. There is nothing in Mark's post that suggests he is grinding a political ax... but your response fairly reeks of it. You might want to be a little more careful with the tar and feathers, some of it seems to be landing on you.
For my part, I agree with Mark on the matter of seeking out alternative funding for research, in cases where the research may end up being suppressed. One hopes that DiMarco and others can find ways to accomplish their research in such a way that they can release it in a timely manner. What good does it do to make the findings available years too late to make a difference?
I'm almost totally certain that any attempt at quarantining the data will fail on appeal. The amount of compelling state interest in having the information flow freely far outweighs any litigation concerns.
I voted for a President 'bigger' than this. For one to envoke the words of Truman and then cower from the truth is lacking integrity. If you won't Nuke the leak closed at least call upon the Dali Lama insights.
http://www.courier-journal.com/article/20100602/GREEN/6020410/-1/rss
Check this link out all geeks out there. Makes you wonder who is calling the shots on this.
Uh, yeah nice. Except those bacteria have a bad habit of depleting all the oxygen. So instead of oil you get large areas of anaerobic water. Dead zones.
Don could you please provide a link or cite a scientific research reference that confirms the specific bacteria (discussed in the link listed by mike b) as depleting all the oxygen to such levels thus creating dead zones? Thanks!
My skills aren't up to the task of providing links. However, I can do the next best thing. From Scientific American, Slick Solution: How Microbes Will Clean Up the Deep Water Horizon Spill.
...
Just like your automobile, these marine-dwelling bacteria and fungi use the hydrocarbons as fuel—and emit the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide (CO2) as a result. In essence, the microbes break down the ring structures of the hydrocarbons in seaborne oil using enzymes and oxygen in the seawater. The end result is ancient oil turned into modern-day bacterial biomass—populations can grow exponentially in days. "Down in the Gulf of Mexico there is an indigenous population [of microbes] adapted to oil from so much marine traffic and daily spills. Oil is not new," says Lee, who has also been monitoring the plumes of oil beneath the surface. "There are so many natural seeps around the world that if it wasn't for microbes we would have a lot of oil in the oceans."
Already, measurements of oxygen depletion of as much as 30 percent in the Gulf of Mexico seawater suggest that the microbes are hard at work eating oil. "I take the 30 percent depletion of oxygen in water near the oil as indicating bacterial degradation," Atlas says.
...
I don't expect you to take my word for it. I might also add that increased carbon dioxide in the water is likely to cause alge blooms (alge being a plant and plants consume CO2) which is also very bad for fish.
On a positive note, the fish and shellfish that come back from all of this will really be some tough-assed species.
Today I heard Senator Nelson finally raise the point I've been waiting for: why aren't we using our full military power to coordinate and respond to the spill crisis on the gulf? I liken this crisis to Pearl Harbor, and how our country responded with speed to a military threat. This is just such a threat, and we need to pull our entire resource base together to solve the oil problem. First we should do what Secretary Reitz suggested: put BP in receivership or nationalize it. We should give BP an immediate bill for ten or more billion dollars and begin massive hiring of people from the coast---don't we have an unemployment problem coupled with a fishing industry that is going under? Put EVERYBODY to work right now, like during the depression, and use the military to coordinate the cleanup strategies. This would serve several purposes, including helping the economy of the gulf area. We should be sending ships into the gulf to help the cleanup and take the boats owned by BP to assist. We should manufacture the necessary materials to collect the oils efficiently. This was or approach to 1) the depression, and 2) the bombing of Pearl Harbor. We have been attacked as a nation by a multi-national conglomerate and need to respond as such. BTW, you, Rachel, foresaw what has been happening, researching the 1979 fiasco. Nothing has changed or been learned in 40 years? Ridiculous!
Cory Wisnia
Corona CA
If DiMarco doesn't have tenure, and is on publish or perish, this data/ research being quarantined is very bad for his career.
go out there, get your data, and TALK ABOUT IT ANYWAY~!!!
Today I heard Senator Nelson finally raise the point I've been waiting for: why aren't we using our full military power to coordinate and respond to the spill crisis on the gulf? I liken this crisis to Pearl Harbor, and how our country responded with speed to a military threat. This is just such a threat, and we need to pull our entire resource base together to solve the oil problem. First we should do what Secretary Reitz suggested: put BP in receivership or nationalize it. We should give BP an immediate bill for ten or more billion dollars and begin massive hiring of people from the coast---don't we have an unemployment problem coupled with a fishing industry that is going under? Put EVERYBODY to work right now, like during the depression, and use the military to coordinate the cleanup strategies. This would serve several purposes, including helping the economy of the gulf area. We should be sending ships into the gulf to help the cleanup and take the boats owned by BP to assist. We should bulk manufacture the necessary materials to collect the oils efficiently. This was our approach to 1) the depression, and 2) the bombing of Pearl Harbor. We have been attacked as a nation by a multi-national conglomerate and need to respond as such. BTW, you, Rachel, foresaw what has been happening, researching the 1979 fiasco. Nothing has changed or been learned in 40 years? Ridiculous!
Is there not someone out there with a couple mil$$ that could fund them as a private citizen? That would avoid the whole gov't owns the info thing. Bill Gates? Steve Jobs? The Waltons? A Lottery winner? If I had it, I would set up a non-profit and fund stuff like that. What else do you do with all that cash??? Sit on it? I know, I know. Wishful thinking.
Some people love it to regulate:
I remember that in the beginning or perhaps in the middle of the second Bush43 term the scientific world was shocked by a new law that banned scientific articles from being published if the results were not in favor of American industries and if there was public funding involved in the research. The articles had to be scrutinized by a federal commission.
There is always public funding involved to arrive at your lab safely, because at least you make use of traffic lights.
For now I don't see the slightest sign that President Obama will block any research on the issue of the oil-spill. It's against his promise of TRANSPARENCY.
Remember November
Remember November, two thousand and eight?
Drill, baby, drill
And the result we now can see, that’s impossible to negate?
Spill, baby, spill
Do oily birds and oily fish have anything to say?
Kill, baby, kill
How ‘bout all the money, that the taxpayers now will pay?
Bill, baby, bill
Do you believe BP’s promise to clean up all the soil?
Nill, baby, nill
Knowing half-governor Palin’s true function for Big Oil?
Shill, baby, shill
Do Tea Baggers sorely need a real good education?
Shrill, baby, shrill
Like Republican’s sermonizing for far less regulation?
Swill, baby, swill
Finger pointing’s not the time where’pon we ought to dwell.
Chill, baby, chill
Now’s the time to dig some berms and cap that blasted well.
Fill, baby, fill