When the Exxon Valdez oil spill happened I was ten years old. A direct consequence of living on the Pacific Coast back in 1989 was that we heard about it on TV,  in the newspapers,  and we studied it endlessly in school. You felt like, at least 10 people were doing their best to target blame and clean it up.

Approximately 250,000 barrels of crude oil were dumped into Prince William Sound’s Blight Reef and at the time it was considered the worse environmental disaster in history. It has taken years to clean up, and as of a few yers ago, it is estimated that 26,000 gallons of oil still remain embedded in the sandy shoreline. Most recently a study by the University of North Carolina believes it may take upwards of another 30 years for the arctic habitants of the regions shoreline to actually recover.

It was an incredible, cataclysmic environment disaster that destroyed and keeps destroying a once environmentally pristine area. The part which impacted me the most, even years later, was the guilt this disaster had impressed on people. Granted, it was the oil tanker’s company whose decision to not repairing a broken radar sensor ultimately caused the disaster, the resulting consequences were felt by every person who saw images of dying animals and oil washing up on beaches. No one who witnessed this event in 1989 could ignore the harsh reality that humans caused this disaster and the lesson that would remain years later was to act more responsibly towards our environment.

The personal toll of such a disaster is sometimes hard to comprehend outside the localized area affected by such an the event. In Cordova, Alaska the toll the oil spill it took on its community affected by the economic collapse of the local marine life for many years to follow, resulted in the several residents, including one former mayor, committed suicide after the spill. With a population of less than 2500 residents, this speaks volumes about the social impact.

So when it comes to comparing what I have experienced in Alaska, as a simple bystander, with what is currently unravelling in the Gulf of Mexico, it does more than just hurt my heart, it makes me fear for the future down South. I keep getting the feeling that bureaucracy is getting in the way of a solution, and people are spending too much time talking. The days, and weeks and soon months that go by with gallons of oil spilling into the environment makes me wonder if anyone has taken a moment to learn something from the 1989 oil spill.

I tried to google to find an estimate on the amount of oil spilled to date in the Gulf, unfortunatly it ranges so extensively that I cannot feel comfortable giving an approximte estimate. What I have learned from even this little bit of research is that ultimately what we do know and we don’t know about this disaster is a very closely monitored by the media, by BP, and by the US government. I am not suggesting a conspiracy theory only that people are thinking before they speak; people are choosing their words very carefully and they are very aware that they are avoiding giving out any actual numbers, perhaps for fear of inaccuracy.The result of which is that we may not know or fully realise the full scope of the environmental disaster until many years later, the consequences of which have the potential to be divesting to both the environment and the economy.

My solution? So far I don't have one, once again 21 years later I feel like a bystander watching things collapse. Unfortunatly the last time this happened I remember feeling a lot more hopeful.