Instructor's Notes

Assessing Resources at Risk

To assess the resources at risk, your students first should check over the map for especially important things, such as

1. endangered or threatened species (endangered species are in danger of becoming extinct; threatened species could easily become endangered if present trends continue).
   
2. sensitive shorelines (shown on the map in warm colors like red and orange). In this part of Delaware Bay, the most sensitive habitats are streamside marshlands, denoted by red lines on the map.

Students can quickly tell whether any endangered or threatened species are present by checking the map for species symbols surrounded by red boxes. A red box indicates an endangered or threatened species. On this map, your students will see a red box around the symbol for the piping plover, as shown in the map segment to the left.

On Map 8, students also can see red lines depicting the most sensitive shorelines, such as those on the map segment at left, marking streamside marshland.

Ask your students: If a threatened or endangered species is present, when is it present and what is it doing?

• The Reading the Back of the Map page (link available below) explains how to read the table from the back of the ESI map to check whether a species is expected to be present at the time of the spill, and to see what it would be doing then.

By reading the back of the map, your students will find that piping plovers are present and busy with reproductive activities in June, the time of the spill. [1]

Your students should discover that, besides the threatened piping plover, endangered whale species, threatened and endangered sea turtles (shown in the "Common in Area" box), endangered/threatened bald eagles, and ospreys (designated as threatened by the state of New Jersey) also are present in this area in June, when the spill would occur. However, generally, we expect these species to be at lower risk from oiling than the plovers:

• Researchers aren't yet sure how badly affected whales might be by oil spills; they suspect that whales avoid oil slicks.
  
• Generally, sea turtles are most at risk of being harmed by oil when they are on beaches laying their eggs; in Delaware Bay in June, they probably remain in the open water, where they are at less risk.
  
• Birds that dive for their food or that habitually rest on the water are at particular risk from oiling, since they are especially likely to contact oil on the water surface. In contrast, bald eagles, which do not dive or rest on the water, are at less risk, unless they feed on dead birds that were oiled in this spill (oil is toxic). To protect eagles and other wildlife, it's a good idea to remove oiled bird carcasses as soon as possible.
  
• Ospreys are the only diving hawks, and so may be at more risk of being oiled than bald eagles. Both ospreys and eagles nest in the marshlands, and are sensitive to disturbances near their nests. The best ways to protect these species are to protect the marshes from oiling and to ensure that cleanup workers and other people stay well away from identified nests.

Setting Protection Priorities

To set their protection priorities, your students should consider the biological resources, the human uses, and the types of shoreline habitat affected by the spill.

Shoreline Habitats

Two main kinds of shorelines exist in the area covered by Map 8:

1. The beaches that make up much of the shoreline in this area are classified as shoreline habitat 4 (medium- to coarse-grained sand beaches), which are not ranked as particularly sensitive to oil spills. Few organisms live within the sand of these beaches, and, although oil that washes up on the beaches will penetrate into the sand, complicating clean-up, it will not penetrate as far as it would into fine-grained beach sand.

   An example of shoreline habitat 4 is the section of the Breakwater Harbor beach shown at left. Shoreline segments classified as shoreline habitat 4 are color-coded with a broad light blue line (the line is hard to see on this example map, because it's overlaid with an orange hatched polygon that indicates shellfish habitat used by horseshoe crabs).

   However, although these beaches are ranked as relatively less sensitive to oiling, piping plovers are present in low concentrations along the outer beach of Beach Plum Island. They are important to protect, whenever possible, because they are a threatened species. However, the plovers are present over an length of beach too long to be protected by boom. (Booms can protect things concentrated in small areas, such as seabird colonies.) Possible options to protect the plovers include

   1. using other measures to prevent the oil from reaching the beach, such as chemical dispersants [2], skimmers, or in-situ burning, and
      
   2. using a deflection boom--a segment of boom placed at an angle to the shoreline--to deflect the oil into the shore before it reaches the plover habitat (this option is difficult to accomplish in real life!).

   Responders sometimes use hazing to drive some kinds of birds away from oiled areas. However, hazing would not be a good measure to protect the plovers, because they are very sensitive to disturbance.

   Note that vegetated dunes may also be present in areas designated as shoreline habitat 4 (they are found above the high tide line). Vegetated dunes are much more sensitive to oiling and other disturbance than the beaches adjacent to them. They should be protected from oiling and from trampling by responders and cleanup crews.

2. More sensitive habitats that would be threatened by this spill include the salt and brackish water marshes (shoreline habitat 10) inside Roosevelt Inlet. These shorelines are ranked as very sensitive to oiling: marshes are biologically rich; marsh vegetation can be killed or damaged by oiling; and oiled marshes are very difficult to clean up without causing additional harm. The marshes behind Roosevelt Inlet are inhabited in June by sensitive species like bald eagles and ospreys. Also, it is especially important to protect marshes because the U.S. is losing wetlands.

Spilled oil could infiltrate into these marshlands through Roosevelt Inlet, shown at left.

A good response option would be to place boom across Roosevelt Inlet, to protect the marshlands from a spill. However, strong currents can sometimes make it hard to keep even short boom sections in place.

Other Protection Priorities

Your students might also suggest protective measures for human use sites in the area of the spill.

Notes

1. Local biologists report that the population of plovers on Beach Plum Island beaches has declined recently as human use of this area has increased. In fact, it's hard to be sure, but it's possible that plovers no longer nest on these beaches. During a response to a real oil spill, oil spill experts don't rely only on ESI maps, which may become outdated when conditions change. They also check with local biologists and other experts to make sure they are using current information to set their protection priorities. [Back]

2. It's sometimes possible to prevent damage to some bird populations by applying chemical dispersants to an oil slick before it contacts the coastline. Dispersants act to remove oil from the water surface by dispersing it into the water column. However, chemical dispersants and oil dispersed into the water column can threaten other marine life. For example, chemical dispersants could threaten horseshoe crab larvae that are present in the water column in June. This is one example of how choosing protection strategies can be an exercise in tradeoffs. [Back]

For More Information You can learn more about how to identify and prioritize sensitive sites and how to develop a protection strategy from the the report available from the page linked below.

Introduction to Coastal Habitats and Biological Resources for Spill Response 1992 training manual covering physical, geological, and biological considerations relevant to oil spill response and cleanup.

Reading the Back of the Map Explains how to read the table from the back of the ESI map.

ESI Maps Overview of ESI maps.

Training Exercise Training module for ESI users. The manual and associated training materials will help spill responders and planners learn to use ESI data in multiple formats.

ESI Toolkit Tools and resources for ESI maps.

ESI Specialist Contact our ESI Specialist for more information.

Downloads

Mechanical Protection Guidelines 1994 manual describing how to identify and prioritize sensitive sites, and how to deploy booms, barriers, and other mechanical protection devices during a spill response. (Document format: PDF, size: 1.0 M)