The Exxon-Valdez oil-spill disaster resonated with important issues such as: the economic nature of legal systems, the safety and health of individuals as opposed to the power of corporations, and the debate as to whether human cleanup efforts or the natural processing of toxins by the earth provided a better remedy for environmental disasters.
It is possible that the exposed vulnerabilities of the legal system to the power of pure economic concerns is of a much more lasting and profound consideration than the ambiguous, if verifiable, impact on the Alaskan coastline itself. At the very least, in purely environmental terms, the disaster should remind all of us that “constant vigilance over safety is required even with familiar technologies and routines”. (Lerbinger, 1997, p. 342).
The background of the disaster is one of human tragedy and human comedy.
The Exxon Valdez departed from the Trans Alaska Pipeline terminal at 9:12 PM. Captain Hazelwood was a known alcoholic and was so intoxicated at the time of the disaster that a review board concluded that a “non-alcoholic would have passed out” (270 F. 3d, at 1236) from the blood-alcohol level evidenced in the Captain at the time of the spill. However, the Captian was not alone in is dereliction of duty as further inquiry uncovered a host of human errors, human delinquencies, and human unpreparedness contributed to the disaster:
The Term Paper on Debate Of Human Cloning
... has seen that arrogant altering can lead to great disaster. Human cloning would be useful as an infertility treatment, but ... be the long sought after fountain of youth? Furthermore, human cloning could also enhance cosmetic procedures. For instance, breast ... world would definitely be overpopulated, and without proper supervision, human cloning would be ridiculously abused. (Mahendran, 3) For example, ...
“Drinking, exhaustion of depleted crews, unqualified pilots on the bridge, violations of basic sailing rules, lax Coast Guard monitoring and a blind reliance on new technology all figured in the grounding on March 24 of the Exxon Valdez, the inquiry has shown” (Egan) The Exxon-Valdez oil spill disaster quickly became the stuff of legend. In part, the raising of the disaster to an archetypal level in the public consciousness was due to its enormity: over ten-million gallons of crude oil and thousands of miles of impacted coastline.
In another respect, the disaster seemed to draw the public’s imagination because the devastation was visible in the immediate cleanup efforts and in the evident destruction of the birds, fish, and other wildlife that were involved with and impacted by the spill.
As moving and profoundly memorable as the images of oil-covered birds and dead sea-life proved to be, the actual environmental impact of the disaster has proven to be much more difficult to elucidate in any sanguine fashion this is due partly to the ambiguity inherent in natural, global processes that are not fully understood by science, and partly due to the massive legal and public-relations activity engaged in by Exxon-Mobile with the aim of “muddying” the initially clear-cut image of the disaster as a man-made nightmare which wrought permanent devastating effects on the Alaskan coastline. It cannot be overstated that the fact of the spill and its continuing impact were as profound on a legal plane as on a purely environmental level.
The story of the spill is a story which has a great many tellers. Most significant for the future of humanity is that the Exxon-Valdez disaster functions as “the story of how corporations can use the legal system and the seeming apathy of the federal government to avoid responsibility for their actions” (Shelby, 2004, p. 16) . The environmental impact of the spill is a story about water intrusion and environmental destruction with, perhaps, a secreted moral about the power of the earth to mend itself.
The Essay on Oil Spill Response
When it comes to mixing oil and water, oceans suffer from far more than an occasional devastating spill. Disasters make headlines, but hundreds of millions of gallons of oil quietly end up in the seas every year, mostly from non-accidental sources Large spills--even though a relatively minor source of ocean oil pollution--can be devastating. The same amount of oil can do more damage in some areas ...
Certainly, the immediate devastation was apparent. Environmental impacts which arise from oil spills are difficult to generalize about. The eventual destruction depends on a host of conditions and factors such as: “the dosage of oil and duration of exposure, the type of oil and the area involved (coastal, estuarine, or open water), the water temperature, the wind speed, the season, the sensitivity and type of ecosystem, and the history of exposure to oil and other pollutants” (Ketkar, 1995, p. 175).
