- Emily Mickus

Oil Spill Stories

       1 boat.12:04 AM. 11 million gallons of oil. 11,000 residents helping restore the water. 2.1 billion dollars spent cleaning up. The Exxon Valdez oil spill was a tragedy for both humans and animals alike. On March 23, 1989, the Exxon Valdez boat left Alaska headed for California. It carried 53 million gallons of oil. On the 24th, it struck Bligh Reef and spilled about 20% of its oil, which was about 11 million gallons. Thousands of animals died as soon as the oil came out, and lmore died afterwards. Seabirds, seals, sea otters, and other animals along with plants were affected. The amount of living things that were killed was too high to be counted, but was staggeringly big. Living in the oil spill area at the time was a man named John Nalson.
        John Nalson, an older man, grew up in Colorado and lived there until 1969. Nalson then moved to the great state of Alaska where he lived right by Prince William Sound, the place where the devastating oil accident occurred. “I just wanted to move,” he explains, “And I wanted to come up here.”
        Nalson was in a different part of Alaska when the oil spilled, but his home was by the contaminated water. “ It was a beautiful place where I lived,,” he said. He went back home a few weeks later. “I came up about a month after the spill,” Nalson said.
        Nalson was a fisherman, so he saw the effects of the spill firsthand, every day. Nalson explains that the effects of the oil spill are still there. “All you have to do is turn over a rock,” he says, “And there’s still oil.” Nalson also said that thousands of animals perished when a boat hit just one rock. “Some of the fish haven’t recovered,” he explains sadly, “:Like the herring.”
        Nalson now drives a bus around Denali National Park in Alaska every day in May through September. He gets to see wildlife all the time that others would only imagine seeing for one day. There are animals like caribou, eagles, and even bears. “I love the environment around here,” Nalson says.
        Nalson doesn’t think there is anything hard about his job as a bus driver, and he enjoys his job. “I love the people on the buses,” he says, “I have a good time.”