"Gulf Ecosystem in Crisis After BP Spill"

"Three years after well blowout, declining seafood catches and deformities point to an environment in distress."



"New Orleans -- Hundreds of kilograms of oily debris on beaches, declining seafood catches, and other troubling signs point towards an ecosystem in crisis in the wake of BP's 2010 oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico."

"'It's disturbing what we're seeing,' Louisiana Oyster Task Force member Brad Robin told Al Jazeera. 'We don't have any more baby crabs, which is a bad sign. We're seeing things we've never seen before.'

Robin, a commercial oyster fisherman who is also a member of the Louisiana Government Advisory Board, said that of the sea ground where he has harvested oysters in the past, only 30 percent of it is productive now.

'We're seeing crabs with holes in their shells, other seafood deformities. The state of Louisiana oyster season opened on October 15, and we can't find any production out there yet. There is no life out there.'"

Dahr Jamail reports for Aljazeera October 20, 2013.

Source: Aljazeera, 10/22/2013