Gulf of Mexico
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Gulf oil spill worse than expected, and getting worser
Like the oil, there’s more news spilling out of (or is it into?) the Gulf of Mexico. And none of it is good. Where to begin? The 5,000-foot-long pipe that links the oil well to Transocean’s now submerged rig has sprung a third leak, which could explain why scientists at NOAA just upped their estimate […]
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How our food system is destroying the nation’s most important fishery
To understand our impact on nature, there is truth in the saying, “everything is connected.” Few situations illustrate this concept as dramatically as the agricultural wastes from the Midwest that contribute so seriously to the aquatic dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico. Human activities and natural phenomena occurring on land masses combine to impact […]
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As the land disappears, an Indian tribe plans to abandon its ancestral Louisiana home
For at least 170 years, Isle de Jean Charles — a narrow ridge of land lying between Bayou Terrebonne and Bayou Pointe-aux-Chene in southeastern Louisiana’s Terrebonne Parish — has been home to members of the Biloxi-Chitimacha tribe, native people related to the Choctaw and part of a larger confederation of Muskogees. But the tribe’s history […]
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Sen. Landrieu’s plan to export Louisiana’s coastal destruction to Florida
While Louisiana struggles to restore coastal wetlands ravaged in large part by decades of oil and gas drilling, its senior senator is leading the effort to lift the ban on drilling off Florida’s Panhandle. U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) is the lone co-sponsor of legislation sponsored by Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) to open up new […]
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An eye on this year’s record-setting hurricane season
1 — rank of Hurricane Wilma in Atlantic storm intensity on record1 12 — Atlantic hurricanes so far this season, tying a record set in 19692 21 — named storms so far this season, tying a record set in 19332 145 — wind speed of Wilma at press time, in miles per hour3 140 — […]
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Altering the market to promote sustainable farming
The Aug. 16 issue of Science magazine features an ominous headline: “Dead Zone Grows.” To the right of the headline is a map of the Gulf of Mexico with an irregular green stripe hugging the shoreline. This is the Dead Zone, an area of the gulf where oxygen levels are so low that most marine […]