“The possible spread of the oil spill from the Deepwater Horizon rig over the course of one year was studied in a series of computer simulations by a team of researchers from the School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology (SOEST) at the University of Hawaii at Manoa. The simulations suggest that the coastlines near the Carolinas, Georgia, and Northern Florida could see the effects of the oil spill as early as October 2010, while the main branch of the subtropical gyre is likely to transport the oil film towards Europe, although strongly diluted. Eight million buoyant particles were released continuously from April 20 to September 17, 2010, at the location of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig. The release occurred in ocean flow data from simulations conducted with the high-resolution Ocean General Circulation Model for the Earth Simulator (OFES). “The paths of the particles were calculated in 8 typical OFES years over 360 days from the beginning of the spill,” says Fabian Schloesser, a PhD student from the Department of Oceanography in SOEST, who worked on these simulations with Axel Timmermann and Oliver Elison Timm from the International Pacific Research Center, also in SOEST. “From these 8 typical years, 5 were selected to create an animation for which the calculated extent of the spill best matches current observational estimates.” http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/07/100706103408.htm added by: DeliaTheArtist
