Leads: Chuck Fisher, Penn State University; Ian MacDonald, Florida State University; Stephanie Sharuga, NOAA
This project obtained deep-sea coral and chemosynthetic organism presence and absence data in the vicinity of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill prior to the spill. This data was used to produce habitat suitability models for deep-sea corals and chemosynthetic ecosystems in the Gulf of Mexico.
Data Sets:
Chuck Fisher: ECOsystem impacts of Oil and Gas Inputs to the Gulf (ECOGIG). Multi-year project that visited the same marked sites near the Macando well to assess health of the corals at each site over time.
Ian MacDonald (at TAMU during this study): Mississippi-Alabama Pinnacle Trend Ecosystem Monitoring (MAPTEM). Four-year program to characterize and monitor microhabitat on the Mississippi/Alabama outer continental shelf.
Stephanie Sharuga (at LSU during this study): Characterization of deep-sea benthic megafauna in the vicintiy of the Macando well.