The Deepwater Horizon drilling rig explosion in the Gulf of Mexico on 20 April 2010 has resulted in the largest oil spill in U.S. history. The release continues to this time and has spread to coastal areas of Louisiana, Mississippi and Florida.
This proposal requests funds for Oceanographic Instrumentation through Grants for Rapid Response Research to purchase a Seal Analytical QuAAtro 4-channel nutrient analysis system for use at sea aboard the R.V. Cape Hatteras in support of research days for the calendar year 2010 and beyond in their efforts to map in near real time the extent of the plume, both at the surface and in the water column.
Broader Impacts: The acquisition, maintenance and operation of shared-use instrumentation allows NSF-funded researchers from any US university or lab access to working, calibrated instruments for their research, reducing the cost of that research, and expanding the base of potential researchers.
The Deepwater Horizon resulted in the release of over 4 million barrels of oil into the northeastern Gulf of Mexico. In response to this spill, an existing research cruise in the area was re-tasked to focus on the immediate impacts of the spill in the July/August time frame. The purchase of a QuAAtro nutrient analyzer system was supported by this funding as part of this effort. The system provide the investigators with the ability to measure nutrients at sea on fresh samples, thereby avoiding the well known artifacts associated with freezing. This is particularly important for biologically active nutrients like ammonium. The analyzer was used on board the R.V. Cape Hatteras (CH08-10) during July/Aug of 2010. During the cruise, 82 stations were occupied and 1,575 nutrient samples were analyzed in duplicate. The resolution provided by this data set will be critical in evaluating how the spill affected the biogeochemical properties of the water column, particularly at the deeper layers where the evidence suggests a plume extended hundreds of miles away from the spill. This data is part of the larger scientific effort examining the effects of the Deepwater Horizon spill and provides a set of high resolution vertical profiles unique to this area.
