Good afternoon! Just wanted to answer a great question one of our co-workers here at WINK posed a few minutes ago to me: given the oil rig explosion southeast of the New Orleans just out into the Gulf earlier this week.. and with the oil rig sinking.. what happens to the oil, where does it go, if there's a leak/spill? For the answer, take a look at the top image, a map of the mean (or average) water currents in the Gulf of Mexico. On average, the central and eastern Gulf is dominated by something known as the Gulf Loop Current, a pool of extra warm water that is part of the Gulf Stream that runs up the east coast and out into the Atlantic. The Gulf Loop Current is the one that we often hear about during hurricane season.. as it brings bath-water warm water out of the Caribbean.
Because of the "loop" (that upside-down U shape you see on the top image.. and the bottom one too) the mean ocean currents in the vicinity of the explosion would work to push any spilled oil toward Biloxi, MS, Mobile, AL, and the Florida Panhandle (there would also be some that would spread out in all other directions.. but the bulk would follow the mean ocean current). In other words, any oil spill would likely not directly impact the waters of southwest Florida. That said, the mean ocean currents can be altered based on the wind pattern.. a pattern that will be southwesterly through much of the weekend (turning northwesterly late this weekend). Either way, any oil spillage would be far more of a concern to the north-central and north-east Gulf Coast than for anywhere this far south.
Brian
