In Deeper Water

In Deeper Water: The DeepWater Horizon Oil SpillSee the image on its own

Depressing update of our original DeepWater Horizon image.

The oil spill is now on track to be the 3rd worst in history, depositing the equivalent of 22,000 cars worth of oil into the sea every day.

More info and our data in this online spreadsheet: http://www.bit.ly/InDeepWater


DESIGN: David McCandless
RESEARCH: David McCandless, James Key, Pearl Doughty-White
ADDITIONAL DESIGN: Joe Swainson
SOURCES: International Energy Association, CIA Factbook, International Tanker Owners Pollution Federation Limited, Press Reports
DATA: Explore in this Google doc

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31 Comments

  1. Will
    Posted June 3, 2010 at 4:48 pm | Permalink

    Can you show the worst spill in the Gulf to date, (I think that’s the 2nd worst in history, Ixtoc-1) for comparison? I try to remind myself that we recovered from I1, so we might recover from DH, too.

  2. Mr Crocus
    Posted June 3, 2010 at 4:59 pm | Permalink

    *Government* upper estimate
    Amoco *Cadiz*
    3rd *worst*
    *Deepwater* Horizon

  3. Pat
    Posted June 3, 2010 at 5:10 pm | Permalink

    I like… but how has the 1989 spill “devastated sea life for 30 years” when it’s been just over 21 years since it happened?

  4. Justin
    Posted June 3, 2010 at 5:16 pm | Permalink

    Goverment –> Government

  5. mwilson
    Posted June 3, 2010 at 5:26 pm | Permalink

    How has the Exxon Valdez devastated (past-tense) sea-life for 30 years when it happened in 1989?

  6. Posted June 3, 2010 at 5:48 pm | Permalink

    It has only been 21 years since 1989, making it impossible to claim 30 years of devastation to wildlife from the Exxon/Valdez oil spill. ;)

    Otherwise, nicely done. Simple, direct and easy to digest. The pink/red color throws me a little — it breaks up the images to avoid monotony, but I feel like the color wants to correlate something between each row but I fail to see it.

  7. Posted June 3, 2010 at 7:20 pm | Permalink

    1989 + 30years = 2019
    2010 – 1989 = 21 years

  8. Posted June 3, 2010 at 7:37 pm | Permalink

    If I may, you are mixing up two shipwrecked supertankers:

    Amoco Cadiz (not Caldiz) in 1978, lost 1.6 Million Barrels

    and

    Torrey Canyon in 1967, lost 740 000 Barrels

  9. Derek
    Posted June 3, 2010 at 10:17 pm | Permalink

    Exxon Valdez occurred in 1989 and “devastated sea life for 30 years” making it all better in… 2019? Perhaps a different wording would be better?

  10. Posted June 3, 2010 at 11:14 pm | Permalink

    It’s truly sad how it has devastated the lives of hardworking people worldwide. I truly hope it can be resolved quickly because the various cities around the world will for some time feel its devastating impact. SAD. “Being Informed is Truly Beautiful “

  11. Christian vdB
    Posted June 4, 2010 at 7:45 am | Permalink

    http://www.beowulfe.com/oil/ is another sobering one.

  12. Chris
    Posted June 4, 2010 at 1:43 pm | Permalink

    It was the Amoco Cadiz (no L in there)

  13. Chris Moorehead
    Posted June 4, 2010 at 11:29 pm | Permalink

    David, the Amoco Cadiz ran aground off Brittany in 1978, not 1967. You’re probably referring to the Torrey Canyon, which ran aground off Cornwall in 1967, & had the dubious distinction of being the first supertanker wreck.

  14. S.D.
    Posted June 5, 2010 at 6:09 am | Permalink

    Great graphic. You may wish to edit it to read, “Third worst oil spill” instead of “third worse.”

  15. EW9
    Posted June 5, 2010 at 1:06 pm | Permalink

    The Amoco Caldiz spill happened in 1978, not 1967 as said in your graphic.

  16. Mike
    Posted June 6, 2010 at 9:39 pm | Permalink

    I don’t think it’s been 30 years since the Exxon Valdez spill.

  17. Mike
    Posted June 6, 2010 at 9:40 pm | Permalink

    Woops, didn’t see that comment there already.

  18. Emma
    Posted June 8, 2010 at 1:41 pm | Permalink

    How about the continuous spills in the Niger Delta?

    Here is an extract from this Guardian article:

    One report, compiled by WWF UK, the World Conservation Union and representatives from the Nigerian federal government and the Nigerian Conservation Foundation, calculated in 2006 that up to 1.5m tons of oil – 50 times the pollution unleashed in the Exxon Valdez tanker disaster in Alaska – has been spilled in the delta over the past half century. Last year Amnesty calculated that the equivalent of at least 9m barrels of oil was spilled and accused the oil companies of a human rights outrage.

  19. Pieter
    Posted June 9, 2010 at 4:29 pm | Permalink

    There is a good post on Cosmic Variance about a graphical misrepresentation of the BP oil spill. In short, someone didn’t make a distinction between linear and quadratic scaling of radius and area, respectively.

  20. iainl
    Posted June 10, 2010 at 3:34 pm | Permalink

    That’s odd. Last time around the 19 gallons of fuel from your standard barrel of oil could fill two cars. Which certainly sits better with my experience of fuel tanks. Well, it’s probably more like a tank and a half, which would explain things, I suppose.

  21. Posted June 11, 2010 at 2:28 am | Permalink

    This graphic was included in a collection of oil spill infographics. I thought the collection of different takes on it was kind of cool and wanted to share: http://pinterest.com/mwaitsman/oil-spill-infographics/.

  22. Posted June 16, 2010 at 7:49 am | Permalink

    If you move to the north will increase. Loss in fact the same area of the map where you put it, what changes is the map for you! Google Maps, and many of the maps are used to seeing, to use something called a "Mercator projection" in order to draw a sphere on a flat surface. This projection distorts space, you move away from the equator, so nice to see a flat map.

  23. Nico
    Posted June 16, 2010 at 11:31 am | Permalink

    The diagram is great, but most the important thing is to keep the data up to date. On June 15, 2010 the US-government estimates a daily outcome of 60.000 barrels a day. That’s more than the worst case estimation in your diagram.

  24. rontotototo
    Posted June 16, 2010 at 3:55 pm | Permalink

    Any chance we could have some beautiful data that isn’t about the environment at some point?

  25. Emma
    Posted June 18, 2010 at 1:59 pm | Permalink

    What’s the worst spill been, by the way?

  26. Posted June 18, 2010 at 10:17 pm | Permalink

    While the visualization is eye catching, perhaps a lyrical wordsmith can compliment it.

  27. Posted July 15, 2010 at 6:34 pm | Permalink

    Well above diagram must be take in concern and the worst situation of the water level is decreasing no doubt. The earth and the pollution is responsible for the whole globally.

  28. Posted August 5, 2010 at 12:53 pm | Permalink

    I truly hope it can be resolved quickly because the various cities around the world will for some time feel its devastating impact.

  29. Posted August 6, 2010 at 7:49 am | Permalink

    I truly hope it can be resolved quickly because the various cities around the world will for some time feel its devastating impact. SAD. “Being Informed is Truly Beautiful “

  30. Posted August 6, 2010 at 1:06 pm | Permalink

    The pink/red color throws me a little — it breaks up the images to avoid monotony, but I feel like the color wants to correlate something between each row but I fail to see it.

  31. yan
    Posted August 6, 2011 at 11:01 am | Permalink

    please update your slide Amoco caldiz is 1978!

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