Following a day of relevant oil spill trainings, the drill kicked off with a hypothetical collision of a container ship and a crude oil tanker within the Greater Farallones National Marine Sanctuary resulting in the release of 60,000 barrels (roughly 2.5 million gallons) of oil.  OR&R's Emergency Response Division provided scientific support to the U.S. Coast Guard and other spill responders on overall NOAA activities and Environmental Unit actions involving potential dispersant use, spatial data (ERMA – Environmental Response Management Application), mock press conference, and environmental tradeoffs of different response methods.

The NRDA (Natural Resource Damage Assessment) team worked with the state and federal co-trustees and the responsible parties (BP and ATC) to set up a NRDA command structure, including identifying a NRDA representative for the Unified Command. Then the NRDA team discussed potential exposure pathways and resources of concern for NRDA for the given scenario. The NRDA team concluded with developing a sampling plan for ephemeral data collection and other preassessment activities. OR&R representatives were Laurie Sullivan and Stephanie Sharuga.  Kirsten Lindquist and Jan Roletto participated for the Greater Farallones National Marine Sanctuary and Natalie Cosentino-Manning participated for NMFS Restoration Center.   

For more information, contact Jordan.Stout@noaa.gov or Laurie.Sullivan@noaa.gov.

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