Dead coral found near BP well site

Bettina Boxall in the Los Angeles Times: Scientists on a research cruise this week found a community of dead and dying deep-sea corals not far from the site of BP's blown-out wellhead. "Within minutes of our arrival … it was evident to the biologists on board that this site was unlike any others that we have seen over the course of hundreds of hours of studying the deep corals in the Gulf of Mexico over the last decade," Penn State University biology professor Charles Fisher and the cruise's chief scientist said in a news release.

A colony of hard coral at a depth of more than 4,000 feet was sloughing off tissue and producing mucus, while a nearby community of soft corals had extensive bare areas. A type of starfish associated with the coral was also in bad shape.

Using a remotely operated robotic vessel, government and academic researchers on the federal ship Ronald H. Brown were surveying coral communities they have studied for several years. Most showed no changes from previous visits.

But when the ship crew focused underwater cameras on colonies seven miles southwest of the BP leak, images of stricken corals, covered with a brown substance, popped up on the screen. The researchers will analyze sediment and coral samples for evidence of hydrocarbons and the chemical dispersants used to break up the crude that spewed for months from BP's Macondo wellhead before it was capped in July….

Spilled oil from the Deepwater Horizon on April 22, 2010, US Coast Guard photo