Kuwait's ruler warned Tuesday that lower oil price was damaging the economy of the oil-rich Gulf state, even as oil moved further lower after a bearish price forecast for the next two years owing to a global supply glut
At least 50 birds of six species have needed treatment due to the oil, said Richard Gibbons, conservation director of the Houston Audubon Society. The species include Sanderling, Ruddy Turnstone and the American white pelican, Gibbons said.
Seawolf Park in Galveston, a popular spot for fishermen and tourists, was closed Monday after considerable amount of oil was spotted in the water.
Parts of Galveston Island were closed to the public as the cleanup entered its third day. Crews have laid booms around environmentally sensitive areas.
The best-case scenario is for most of the slick to remain in the Gulf for several days or longer and congeal into small tar balls that wash up further south on the Texas coast, where they could be picked up and removed, Jerry Patterson, commissioner
The closure stranded some 80 vessels on both sides of the channel. Traffic through the channel includes ships serving refineries key to American oil production.
With cleanup well underway, the Coast Guard said it hoped to have the channel open to barge traffic as quickly as possible but that more tests were needed to confirm the water and the vessels traveling through the channel were free of oil. Officials
Crews lined the sand on Galveston Bay Monday, March 24, capturing tar balls as strong tides kept pushing more onto the beach, the Associated Press reported.
A barge carrying about 900,000 gallons of the heavy oil collided with a ship on Saturday in the busy Houston Ship Channel, spilling as much as a fifth of its cargo, said a Coast Guard.
Clean-up crews have being working around the clock to contain the spill, going as far as to closing down one of the world's busiest waterways for moving petrochemicals, but traces of oil have still been detected as far out as the Gulf of Mexico.