The Disaster

Just after midnight on March 24, 1989, the Exxon Valdez, an oil tanker, hit Bligh Reef in the Prince William Sound dumping 11 million gallons of crude oil into the waters, the worst oil spill in United State's history.

The Prince William Sound, an island body of water off of Alaska's southern coast, is home to one of the country's richest concentrations of wildlife, as well as booming fishing industries and native villagers.

The sound also serves as a thorough fare for the Alaska Pipeline's oil tankers shipping oil to the consumers of the lower 48 states.

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Description in Detail• The Exxon Valdez, after receiving 53 million cargo of crude, pulled away

from the Valdez pipeline terminal at 9:26 P.M.• The Exxon Valdez is almost a thousand feet long and at its top speed of

15 miles per hour it would take 3 miles for it to come to a halt. • Captain Joseph Hazelwood radioed the coast guard that he would be

changing course in order to avoid small icebergs which had drifted in to the Prince William Sound from the Columbia Glacier. The Captain received permission to move into the northbound lane.

• Before retiring to his cabin, Captain Hazelwood instructed his third mate Gregory Cousins to start coming into the southbound lanes once the ship was abeam Busby Island Light, some two minutes ahead. Although Cousins did give the instructions to the helmsman to steer the vessel, the vessel was not turning sharply enough and at 12:03 A.M. it struck Bligh Reef and spilled 11 million gallons of oil into the sound.

• It created waves of oil three feet above water level. Hazelwood, attempting to get the vessel loose from the reef did not phone the Coast Guard until twenty minutes after the collision, finally gave up maneuvering the vessel nearly two hours later.

Cleanup Conditions

• One of the conditions on which the Trans Alaska Pipeline was constructed was that Alyeska submit an oil spill response plan.

• According to that plan, Alyeska would be at the site with response equipment within five hours of the spill.

• However, at the time of the Valdez spill, little of the oil-containment equipment was ready and the barge, which should have much of the equipment already on it, sat nearly empty.

• It would be ten hours before clean up crews would arrive; at this point the oil slick had spread for miles.

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The Cleanup• Alaska's natives, fishermen and environmentalists have

always been weary of the oil industry in the region for the risk of an oil spill. The accident touched off a battle between the native Alaskans and the oil industry, both in the court room and in the press, not only over the accident but the future of the region and the future of oil transportation and oil spill readiness.

• Exxon led the clean up effort with 11,000 workers in the summer months and spent some $1.9 billion.

• Sea otter rehabilitation centers were established while salmon and herring fisheries were closely isolated and monitored.

• Even today, scientists are still attempting to determine the ecological damage caused by the spill.

Impact on Fishing Industry• The state canceled the opening to the

herring fisheries and restricted the salmon take. Due to these closings, the commercial fishermen lost $136.5 million the year of the spill.

• The fishermen have lost a total of $580.4 million because of spill tainted the reputation of Alaskan salmon. Further losses include $154.8 million more due to damage to the ecosystem and depleted fish stocks.

• The state study records shows that the value of commercial salmon harvest in Prince William Sound in the year before the spill was nearly $70 million but in 1993, the value of the harvest was only approximately $24.7 million.

Exxon’s Stand

• To counter these claims Exxon stressed that due to an increase in the world supply of fish in recent years, the world price has dropped. It is also important to note that salmon runs of the summer of 1994 were much higher than projected, signaling perhaps that lingering oil contamination affecting salmon is no longer a valid claim.

• Exxon is still making the claim that this drop in numbers of fish may be due to cyclical changes in ocean temperatures which affect the food supplies of fish.

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Impact on Tourism Industry• Business segments most negatively affected

by the spill include lodges and resorts, Alaska-based package tour companies, guided outdoor activities, charter and sightseeing boats.

EFFECTS ON VISITORS• According to a report prepared by the

McDowell Group, entitled "An Assessment of the Impact of the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill on The Alaska Tourism Industry," the major negative effects are as follows-

• Decreased resident and non-resident visitor traffic in the spill-affected areas of Valdez, Homer, Cordova, and Kodiak.

• Visitor spending decreased 8 percent in South central Alaska and 35 percent in Southwest Alaska from previous summer spending, the two major spill-affected areas. The net result was a loss of $19 million in visitor spending.

EFFECTS ON THE BUSINESS

• Of the businesses surveyed, in spill-affected areas, 43% felt their business had been significantly or completely affected by the oil spill

• Severe labor shortage in the visitor industry due to industry workers seeking high-paying clean-up jobs. Result was a higher cost of doing business

• 59 %of businesses in the most spill-affected areas reported spill-related cancellations and 16 % reported business was less than expected due to the spill.

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Impact on The Environment

According to the damage assessment studies of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration-

• Some 3,500-5,000 sea otters died (or a third of all otters in the Prince William Sound),

• A pod of killer whales lost 13 of its 36 members. • Some 200-300 bald eagles perished, • 175,000-300,000 common murres died, • The fry of pink salmon were found to be genetically

abnormal• Millions of herring larvae that hatched in oiled areas

developed structural defects which lead to their deaths. • But no species were in danger of extinction from the oil

spill.

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Effects on Native American CultureThe culture or way of life of the

Alaskan native communities were very much effected by the oil spill.

• Their subsistence way of hunting, gathering, and fishing was threatened and altered. Their claims were given separate attention.

• Exxon attempted to appease them by compensating them initially with money, flown in groceries, and when native villages began to complain of missing their subsistence foods, Exxon arranged to have seal meat and seaweed shipped in.

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