One year after the Deepwater BP oil spill, state and federal agency-led partners have collected almost 30,000 Natural Resource Damage Assessment samples to determine the impacts to the Gulf’s natural resources. It’s an unprecedented number of samples compared to any other U.S. oil spill.

Scientists have been collecting thousands of plant, animal, soil, and water samples to help them determine the extent of restoration the parties responsible for the spill must implement to fully compensate the American public.

As such, the samples must be handled with the utmost care and precision. After

A year ago, the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig sank, starting an oil spill that became the worst man-made environmental disaster our nation has ever seen. Since then, NOAA has been hard at work with a team of state and federal partners assessing the damage to the Gulf of Mexico as part of the Natural Resource Damage Assessment (NRDA) process. 

In that time, we have:

• collected nearly 30,000 samples of water, sediment, and tissue affected by the spill,
• validated more than 18,000 analyses of those samples,
• surveyed thousands of miles of shoreline for oil,
• posted more than 60 work plans and

Title: Gulf Coast Ecosystem Restoration Task Force Public and NGO Listening Session on Gulf Coast Ecosystem RestorationLocation: Isiah Fredericks Community Center, 3312 Martin Luther King Drive, Gulfport, MS 39501Link out: Click hereDescription: This listening session is designed to be a forum for interested members from the public and non-governmental organizations to provide individual input that will inform the development of the restoration strategy. The focus will be on obtaining your individual input on priority issues, existing impediments, and key outcomes or actions for the

Title: Gulf Coast Ecosystem Restoration Task Force Public and NGO Listening Session on Gulf Coast Ecosystem RestorationLocation: Congressman Solomon P. Ortiz International Center, Kleberg Room, 402 Harbor Drive; Corpus Christi, TX 78401Link out: Click hereDescription: This listening session is designed to be a forum for interested members from the public and non-governmental organizations to provide individual input that will inform the development of the restoration strategy. The focus will be on obtaining your individual input on priority issues, existing impediments, and key outcomes or

Title: Gulf Coast Ecosystem Restoration Task Force Public and NGO Listening Session on Gulf Coast Ecosystem RestorationLocation: University of South Florida Sarasota-Manatee, Selby Auditorium; 8350 North Tamiami Trail; Sarasota, FL 34243Link out: Click hereDescription: This listening session is designed to be a forum for interested members from the public and non-governmental organizations to provide individual input that will inform the development of the restoration strategy. The focus will be on obtaining your individual input on priority issues, existing impediments, and key outcomes or

As part of the ongoing Natural Resource Damage Assessment that has followed the Deepwater BP oil spill, federal and state partners have reached an agreement with BP to begin a new effort to restore submerged aquatic vegetation that was damaged by response vessels and activities.

Members of the public shared their ideas about broad restoration types to restore the Gulf following the Deepwater BP oil spill at scoping meetings that took place in March and April. The scoping meetings are part of the Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement process.

The meetings provided the public an opportunity to comment on the types of restoration projects they would like used to offset the potential impacts to natural resources–and the human uses of them–caused by the BP oil spill.

More than 500 citizens attended the meetings, 10 of which were held throughout the Gulf Coast

We recently posted more work plans, bringing the total to nearly 65 work plans on the NRDA Workplans and Data page. We’ve also made them easier to access and search. These work plans are produced by the technical working groups, each of which are charged with assessing the impacts from the spill to a specific natural resource (including marine mammals and turtles, seagrass, and corals). These work plans are developed by the groups to plan what data they are going to collect and how they will collect it.

The process for development of each plan reflects input and advice from experienced