Thankfully, things aren’t always bigger in Texas.
Texas tar balls
Well, we finally got hit—knew we couldn’t dodge that BP bullet forever—but, so far at least, the tar balls that washed ashore recently were pretty few and far between. Counting the four locations along the Texas Gulf Coast that reported seeing tar balls on the beach, including East Beach in Galveston and Crystal Beach on the Bolivar Peninsula, the grand total of the dime- to nickel-sized weathered tar balls amounted to only about a dozen gallon bucketsful. By Louisiana standards, that’s a pittance.
Checking out East Beach
Interestingly, authorities have posited that what has washed up on local beaches may be an anomaly—that is, what we are seeing may actually be remnants that have hitched a ride on the hulls of ships passing through the spill area and heading up into the Houston ship channel and may not be the result of oil being carried on currents to our shores directly from the spill itself.
If that’s true, and we can only hope it is, once these sticky bits are picked up, we may be back in business. Literally.
But there’s a long hurricane season to get through yet, millions of barrels of errant oil spoiling the Gulf, with capricious winds and currents that could still spell trouble for us Texas coastal residents.
Keep your fingers crossed…