Fears that the huge Gulf of Mexico oil spill was spreading through ocean currents flared on Tuesday after tarballs were found on Florida's Key West, while energy giant BP Plc worked to capture more of the leaking crude.
Tests were trying to confirm whether the oil balls found on the well-known island resort on Monday came from BP's ruptured undersea well. Florida was bracing for potential impact from the spill on the state's $60 billion-a-year tourism industry.
"We believe it is unlikely (the tarballs) are from the Gulf oil spill, but we'll know for sure in a couple of days. While we are concerned about what will happen, we are trying to keep a positive attitude," Key West Mayor Craig Cates said.
If confirmed, it would be the southernmost and easternmost impact reported so far from the massive Gulf of Mexico oil spill, which is feared will eclipse the 1989 Exxon Valdez accident off Alaska as the worst US ecological disaster.
Held squarely responsible by the Obama administration for an environmental calamity that is already hitting Gulf Coast economies and ecosystems, London-based BP was moving ahead with undersea attempts to contain and shut off the leaking well. After managing to insert a mile (1.6 km)-long siphon tube into the leaking riser pipe of its blownout well, BP said it was now capturing an estimated 2,000 barrels per day from the leak. This was about 40 percent of the 5,000 barrels (210,000 gallons/795,000 liters) BP has estimated to be leaking daily. It hopes to increase this containment. BP's stock was initially up more than 1 percent in London on Tuesday, but later fell back slightly. The company estimated the bill for the oil cleanup at $625 million, $175 million higher than a few days ago, with analysts saying costs could reach into the billions. In a sign of the spill's widening impact, the United States nearly doubled the no-fishing zone in waters seen affected by the oil, extending it to 19 percent of US waters in the Gulf.
Many experts believe oil from the Gulf of Mexico spill may have already been caught up in the powerful Loop Current curling around the Florida Peninsula, which could take it into the Florida Keys and possibly up the East Coast.
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration chief Jane Lubchenco said that since a south-eastern tendril of oil from the slick was close to the Loop Current, it was likely to be swept up in the current, if it was not already. BP Chief Executive Tony Hayward was quoted by Sky News as saying he believed the ecological impact from the spill would be light. "I think the environmental impact of this disaster is likely to have been very, very modest," he said.
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