Word: exxon
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...fast, Exxon. While workers were filling planes and buses on the way home, Alaska Governor Steve Cowper and state environment commissioner Dennis Kelso called a press conference in Valdez. They named the "dirty dozen" beaches that they charge are still fouled with oil and announced their own modest $21 million winter cleanup program, at least part of which will be paid for by Exxon. The message to the company was clear: You didn't get the job done, and you're leaving too early...
...quite a bit remains. Though the area's wildlife populations will survive, their ranks have been reduced and are still suffering. No one knows how many years or decades it will take the land and water -- and the psyches of Alaskans -- to recover fully. The only certainty is that Exxon still faces a long siege of recriminations, lawsuits and expense as the company tries to atone for one of the most colossal corporate blunders of all time...
...most indelible image of the spill is that of dead and dying creatures. The body count so far includes 34,000 birds (among them were 139 bald eagles) and 984 sea otters. (One man also died, crushed in the dumbwaiter of a ship in the Exxon cleanup fleet.) Scientists believe the actual wildlife toll is much higher. Recovered bird carcasses, for example, may represent only 5% to 10% of the victims. Many dead otters disappeared under the water, and searches for other animals were limited to the high-water marks on some of the affected islands to respect the wishes...
...commercial salmon catch in the sound this season was only 61% of the average for the past two years. Says Raymond Cesarini, president of Sea Hawk Seafoods in Valdez: "It's been a hideous year for us." Cesarini, who filed a lawsuit against Exxon, says he had expected to process 14 million lbs. of fish but got only 3 million. On a positive note, the three large commercial fish hatcheries in the spill's path were protected, and millions of salmon returned in late summer to spawn in glacial streams along the sound...
Antipathy toward Exxon threatens to obscure the fact that it mounted the largest response ever to an oil spill. The effort was like organizing an infantry division from scratch and deploying it in battle within 60 days. At the cleanup's peak, Exxon marshaled more than 1,400 boats, 85 aircraft and 11,300 people. With that mobilization came such daily logistic headaches as providing 200 tons of food and disposing of 1,400 gal. of human waste in a remote and unforgiving environment. "I think Exxon did a hell of a job," says David Usher, whose firm Marine Pollution...