‘Dirty Blizzard’ sent 2010 Gulf oil spill pollution to seafloor

Scientists working in the Gulf of Mexico have found that contaminants from the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill lingered in the subsurface water for months after oil on the surface had been swept up or dispersed. In a new study, they detailed how remnants of the oil, black carbon from burning oil slicks and contaminants from drilling mud combined with microscopic algae and other marine debris to descend in a ‘dirty blizzard’ to the seafloor.