The recent BP oil spill disaster, aka the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, has greatly affected America’s marine environment as well as the local fishing and tourism industries in the Gulf of Mexico. It has also spoiled some travel plans for a tourist about to have a beach vacation in Florida. According to an ABC News Travel article, Kathryn Calley cancelled her trip because of the oil spill but unfortunately her travel insurance could not give her reimbursement for the cancelled flights. The reason? The oil spill is considered a manmade disaster and not a natural disaster which can be covered by standard travel insurance. Ugh, what a disappointment for not having to go on with a planned holiday and not even getting refund for the airfare or rebooking fees.
How about the cruise industry? While tourism in the Gulf region, particularly beach destinations, has been affected by the disaster, the cruise industry so far has not dealt with interruptions in their cruise schedules. As reported in ABC News Travel, some ships though, such as those from Carnival Cruise Lines, made some minor changes in their usual course in order to avoid oil spill areas that are most affected.
Meanwhile, some photos about the oil spill are featured in the AOL Travel News article “BP Oil Spill: Disturbing Images of a Disaster”. The compiled photos are from the Fort Jackson Wildlife Rehabilitation Center, the IBRRC (International Bird Rescue Rehabilitation Center), the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries, Greenpeace and various twitter and flickr users showing heavily oiled brown pelicans, aerial photos of oil washing up on the gulf coast, workers cleaning up an oil spilled beach in Grand Terre Island, Louisiana and other heartbreaking scenes.
God bless IBRRC (International Bird Rescue Rehabilitation Center) for their hard work in taking care of the gulf-oiled pelicans.
Photo credits: Thanks to jeferonix of grassrootsmapping.org for the aerial photo and IBRRC for the oiled pelicans.
this is indeed sad, Carey, yes, God bless IBRRC for their hardwork to rescue the gulf-oiled coastal birds.
Hi Betchai, I feel like crying when I see the poor suffering birds… and it’s all because of man’s carelessness. BP should pay the price!
It just boggles the mind how long it took to finally make even the smallest amount of headway, BP left a lot to be desired in the whole affair. What I find hard to believe is that a multinational cooperation like BP, with over a 100 years experience in the business, couldn’t do more. Companies like BP really have gotten too much of our trust for too long. This is sad, so very sad.
The worst part of the whole situation is that is that so many people have had their livelihood pulled out from under their feet.
actually i dream to have a Carnival Cruise in the next few years, i am still trying to earn more money to afford it
I saw on the news today that BP is making a profit again. How is it possible that companies that ruined so many lives are allowed to exist? Did they really pay enough for what they did?