Scores of sea turtles hit hardest by the Gulf of Mexico oil spill will be released into an uncertain future today as the government and oil company BP make their final plans for "killing" the rogue well.
BP plans to plug the well by blasting mud and cement into its top on Aug. 2, Incident Commander Thad Allen told reporters Monday. The final plug of mud and cement blasted from deep underground could begin Aug. 7, in a process known as a "bottom kill," Allen said.
Also Monday, the Center for Biological Diversity filed a lawsuit demanding that the Department of Interior re-evaluate the effects of a large oil spill on the Gulf's endangered turtles and whales because earlier approvals of Gulf drilling relied on assumptions that oil spills were unlikely.
More than 500 sea turtle deaths among several species have been documented by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's fisheries program, spokeswoman Connie Barclay said. Turtle strandings in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and the Florida Panhandle have been "much higher" since the Gulf spill, she said.
Donna Shaver, chief of the division of sea turtle science and recovery at Padre Island National Seashore in Texas, said the turtles need to walk through the sand of Padre Island to "imprint" on the location so they'll return and nest there years later.
Shaver has already released 7,000 to 8,000 hatchlings this year, she said. The hatchlings are protected from birds as they crawl across the sand and swim through the breakers into the sea.
The turtles then swim one to four days until they reach patches of seaweed where they can hide from predators and find food, said Juan Rodriguez, chief of interpretation and education at Padre Island.
"Mother Nature is calling them," Rodriguez said. "They need to go out and be turtles in their world."
Adult females are most at risk, Rodriguez said, because their favorite places to eat are in the coastal marshes of Louisiana, where the oil first hit land.
While most Gulf of Mexico sea turtles are elsewhere, the Kemp's Ridley turtles scheduled to be released today spend most of their lives in the Gulf and therefore are most threatened by the spill, said Todd Steiner, director of the Turtle Island Restoration Network, which works to protect sea turtles. Steiner opposes the release because currents where the turtles will float lead into oil-polluted areas.
"We believe they're going to get into the oil and die," Steiner said.
BP plans to plug the well by blasting mud and cement into its top on Aug. 2, Incident Commander Thad Allen told reporters Monday. The final plug of mud and cement blasted from deep underground could begin Aug. 7, in a process known as a "bottom kill," Allen said.
Also Monday, the Center for Biological Diversity filed a lawsuit demanding that the Department of Interior re-evaluate the effects of a large oil spill on the Gulf's endangered turtles and whales because earlier approvals of Gulf drilling relied on assumptions that oil spills were unlikely.
More than 500 sea turtle deaths among several species have been documented by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's fisheries program, spokeswoman Connie Barclay said. Turtle strandings in Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and the Florida Panhandle have been "much higher" since the Gulf spill, she said.
Donna Shaver, chief of the division of sea turtle science and recovery at Padre Island National Seashore in Texas, said the turtles need to walk through the sand of Padre Island to "imprint" on the location so they'll return and nest there years later.
Shaver has already released 7,000 to 8,000 hatchlings this year, she said. The hatchlings are protected from birds as they crawl across the sand and swim through the breakers into the sea.
The turtles then swim one to four days until they reach patches of seaweed where they can hide from predators and find food, said Juan Rodriguez, chief of interpretation and education at Padre Island.
"Mother Nature is calling them," Rodriguez said. "They need to go out and be turtles in their world."
Adult females are most at risk, Rodriguez said, because their favorite places to eat are in the coastal marshes of Louisiana, where the oil first hit land.
While most Gulf of Mexico sea turtles are elsewhere, the Kemp's Ridley turtles scheduled to be released today spend most of their lives in the Gulf and therefore are most threatened by the spill, said Todd Steiner, director of the Turtle Island Restoration Network, which works to protect sea turtles. Steiner opposes the release because currents where the turtles will float lead into oil-polluted areas.
"We believe they're going to get into the oil and die," Steiner said.
