HOUSTON, April 27 (UPI) -- The oil spill from last week's oil rig explosion near Louisiana is smaller than a huge 1979 spill near Mexico, but potentially more devastating, experts said.
The oil slick from the Deepwater Horizon's well explosion and fire in the Gulf of Mexico April 20 is worse than the 1979 Ixtoc 1 leak, if for no other reason than that 11 oil worker's lives were lost, the Houston Chronicle reported Tuesday.
The Deepwater Horizon oil slick currently is approximately 80 miles long and 48 miles wide, the newspaper said.
The Ixtoc well poured about 140 million gallons of oil into the Gulf for 295 days before it was capped. The current spill is an estimated 42,000 gallons per day. It would take nine years for the Deepwater Horizon spill to match the 1979 spill, the Chronicle reported.
The April 20 oil spill is closer to the U.S. Gulf coast shores, and there is concern that it could damage the coastline more than did the 1979 spill, scientists said.
But marine biologists say the clean-up system is better now than it was more than 30 years ago.
"We're better prepared now. If they're able to clean it up out there in the open water, that's the best thing they can do," said Wes Tunnell, a marine biologist with the Corpus Christi Harte Research Institute for Gulf of Mexico studies.
I'm not fat, I'm fluffy!
Judge Smails:
"Its easy to grin, when your ship comes in, and you've got the stock market beat. But the man worth while is the man that can smile with his shorts too tight in the seat."
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