Scientists find lots of oil on gulf floor

NEW ORLEANS, Oct. 25 (UPI) -- Large amounts of oil have accumulated on the floor of the Gulf of Mexico despite official claims crude from the BP spill had dissipated, marine scientists say.

The research ship Cape Hatteras found oil in samples dug up from the seafloor 140 miles around the site of the Macondo well, Kevin Yeager, a University of Southern Mississippi assistant professor of marine sciences, told USA Today.

The Macondo well, operated by BP, exploded April 19, killing 11 workers and spewing more than 200 millions of gallons of oil into the gulf before it was capped in mid-July.

Oil found in samples on the gulf floor ranged from light degraded oil to thick raw crude, Yeager said.

A research team on the Arctic Sunrise, sponsored by Greenpeace, also turned up traces of oil in sediment samples, as well as evidence of chemical dispersants in blue crab larvae and long plumes of oxygen-depleted water emanating from the Deepwater Horizon well site.

Yeager said his team still needs to "fingerprint" the samples to establish that the oil came from the runaway well. But the quantity of oil and its proximity to the site makes it "highly likely," he said.

Steve Lehmann, a scientist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, told The (New Orleans) Times-Picayune last week his agency had not found any oil on the seafloor.