Florida may as well branch out into new forms of food...


NEW ORLEANS — A thick, 22-mile plume of oil discovered by researchers
off the BP spill site was nearing an underwater canyon, where it could
poison the foodchain for sealife in the waters off Florida.

The discovery by researchers on the University of South Florida
College of Marine Science's Weatherbird II vessel is the second
significant undersea plume reported since the Deepwater Horizon
exploded on April 20. The plume is more than 6 miles wide and its
presence was reported Thursday.

The cloud was nearing a large underwater canyon whose currents fuel
the foodchain in Gulf waters off Florida and could potentially wash
the tiny plants and animals that feed larger organisms in a stew of
toxic chemicals, another researcher said Friday.

Larry McKinney, executive director of the Harte Research Institute for
Gulf of Mexico Studies at Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi, said
the DeSoto Canyon off the Florida Panhandle sends nutrient-rich water
from the deep sea up to shallower waters.

McKinney said that in a best-case scenario, oil riding the current out
of the canyon would rise close enough to the surface to be broken down
by sunlight. But if the plume remains relatively intact, it could
sweep down the west coast of Florida as a toxic soup as far as the
Keys, through what he called some of the most productive parts of the
Gulf.

The plume was detected just beneath the surface down to about 3,300
feet, said David Hollander, associate professor of chemical
oceanography at USF