LAFOURCHE PARISH, La. — To folks in Lafourche Parish, like Scarlet Conway, the bayou that slowly flows through their home has always been a part of life.
“As a child I can remember them blowing the whistles from the tugboats,” said Conway.
Her memories of the bayou will now include an oil spill. As a lifelong resident, Conway worries about what the impacts on life here will be.
“It’s always been part of our culture, have never known a life without the bayou here,” said Conway.
Over the weekend, more than 34,000 gallons of crude oil spilled out of the Crescent Midstream facility in Raceland. It flowed into a drainage ditch and into Bayou Lafourche.
“We know about half of it was captured inside of the facility and we think about another 400 or so gallons is actually what hit the bayou,” said Lafourche Parish President Archie Chaisson.
Chaisson says most of the oil is contained and expects clean-up to finish next week.
“It’s a mess, it smells, and it spreads out,” said retired LSU environmental sciences professor Edward Overton.
Overton, who has worked on many oil spills, says the spill in Lafourche has a lot of best-case scenarios.
“It’s offshore crude oil which is generally a fairly light crude oil, light meaning it will readily evaporate,” said Overton. “It doesn’t have a lot of high molecular weight.”
A former chemist for NOAA’s emergency response division during the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in 2010, Overton says favorable weather has also played a role. He’s not connected to the Lafourche spill but says response and cleanup efforts are textbook.
“The responders are getting in with vacuum devices and sucking it off the water. That’s about all they can do,” said Overton.
As crews clear out oil-soaked vegetation and try to prevent any more animals from dying, Chaisson says the parish is working to figure out what happens next.
“We are working with the EPA and the company’s toxicologist to make sure there are no long-term impacts,” said Chaisson.
Overton expects any long-term impacts to be minimal. He says the oil hasn’t mixed with the environment enough to create any.
“You can never get it all. There will be residual areas,” said Overton. “The good news is the oil is very biodegradable and so your natural bacteria in those swampy areas will degrade the oil over time.”
For folks living through it, they just want time to hurry up.
“It’s heartbreaking because it’s never been like this, never seen the bayou like this,” said Conway.
Drinking water and air quality are being checked regularly. So far, there have been no issues with either.
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