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 Home | Image Galleries | Emergency Response
Mearns Rock Time Series
A photo time series of Mearns Rock, a large boulder located in the intertidal zone at Snug Harbor on Knight Island, Prince William Sound, Alaska.
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Mearns Rock 1994
What You See
Fucus has completely left the boulder, leaving it dominated by approximately 2-year-old mussels (black areas on the boulder) and scattered barnacles. Very little seaweed is growing on the beach face. Where did the plants go? Why aren't they growing here anymore?
What's Happening
In 1993 and 1994, something happened that caused a great reduction in the abundant marine life on this shoreline. NOAA biologists believe that the loss of seaweed, mussels, and barnacles is part of the growth cycle of the marine life, rather than due to oiling per se.
(07.01.94, Snug Harbor, Knight Island, Alaska)
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| Related Pages on Our Site |
- Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Overview of the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill in Prince William Sound, Alaska. Includes links to many related resources, including photo galleries.
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- Graphing Changes in Marine Life Abundance Try your hand at some marine biology! Follow these steps, designed for middle and high school students, to make a study of the marine life occupying a section, or quadrat, of Mearns Rock.
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- Mearns Rock Time Series How does marine life recover from a major, one-time stress, such as an oil spill? As you will learn here, the answer is not simple.
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- Northwest Bay Study Site Photos of one of our study sites, a rocky beach on an islet in Northwest Bay, shortly after high-pressure, hot-water washing in 1989, and again in 1998.
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- Response to the Exxon Valdez Spill Within hours after the tanker Exxon Valdez spilled nearly 11 million gallons of crude oil into Alaska's Prince William Sound on March 24, 1989, a team of NOAA OR&R scientists arrived on-scene.
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