The Exxon Valdez Oil Spill
The Exxon Valdez Oil Spill, one of the largest man made natural disasters of all time, is commonly believed to have been caused by the negligence of the skipper who was drunk at the wheel. But recent research has shown the skipper was not at the wheel at all but was actually sleeping off his drunk when the third mate grounded the ship in the rocky straights of Prince William Sound. The result was the spilling of 11 million gallons of oil into the environmentally sensitive area.
The great tragedy of the matter is that it could have been prevented had Exxon followed their own safety standards. But in efforts to save money they left the boat running with faulty equipment for more than a year before the accident. Even more shocking is the fact that the Rycas Radar System, which would have allowed the 3rd mate to maneuver the ship safely through the straights, was turned off because the executives at Exxon deemed it too expensive to run. Even worse, the clean up ship that was legally required to ride alongside all oil tankers going through the strait was in dry dock at the time of the accident, allowing what should have been a containable spill to become one of the greatest environmental disasters in history.
Shocking evidence collected by Greg Palast ( www.gregpalast.com ) shows how efforts made by Captain James Woodle, Valdez Port Commander, to express the dangers of an oil spill in the Prince William Sound due to aging equipment, undermanned and undertrained clean up teams were not only ignored but purposely disregarded. The captain was apparently told when he reported a previous smaller spill in the same area, “You made a mistake. There was not an oil spill.”
This attitude is shown by Palast to have been standard operating procedure for Exxon and their partner company British Patrolium. The companies hired native workers who lived in the area to train for oil-spill containment. But what they found was that they were actually told to cover up oil spills rather than contain them. 2000 gallon spills were to be reported as 2 gallon spills. In the end however, the native teams were all fired once Exxon and BP broke the dock workers union strike, the dock workers were then put back on oil-clean up duty. With little training, old or non-existent equipment and a mandate to keep the area clean by leaving spills unreported.
The irony is that after the mistakes and downright criminal negligence shown by Exxon that led to the accident they were highly praised for their clean-up efforts. Even though many accounts show Exxon trying to deal with the problem as quickly and cheaply as possible, passing most of the work off onto locals and volunteers.