“Fetched Up”: Unlearned Lessons from
the Exxon Valdez
Stephen Haycox
The grounding of the oil tanker Exxon Valdez on Bligh Reef in Alaska’s pristine Prince
William Sound on March 24, 1989, was one of the greatest environmental disasters in the
United States prior to the explosion and subsequent wellhead leak of BP’s Deepwater Horizon
oil rig and the Macondo prospect in the Gulf of Mexico. In Alaska, between 11 and 32
million gallons of crude oil poured into the Sound. Four days later, a storm with winds of
seventy miles per hour drove the oil onto the sand and rock beaches and then southwest
from the Sound along Alaska’s outer coast on the Gulf of Alaska, eventually spreading
nearly five hundred miles from the spill site and fouling one thousand miles of irregular
shoreline. As a result of the spill, scientists estimate mass mortality among sea otters and
harbor seals, and an unprecedented number of seabird deaths. Macroalgae and benthic
invertebrates were also killed by a combination of chemical toxicity, smothering, and
physical displacement from their habitat by the pressure washing used to clean the oiled
shores. For people living in communities on the Sound, including two native villages
whose residents depended on the subsistence harvest of the water’s resources, the impact
of the spill constituted an emotional, psychological, and economic tragedy. Its effects linger: oil still lying around rocks and in sand, and a profound sense of loss among people.1
On April 21, 2010, as workers on the Deepwater Horizon oil-drilling rig were completing
an exploration well into the Macondo prospect, an offshore oil-and-gas drilling block in
the Gulf of Mexico, the well erupted, the rig burned and sank, and the well poured an
estimated 4.9 million barrels of oil into the Gulf over nearly three months before the well
was capped and sealed. The event created the largest marine oil spill in the history of the
petroleum industry. Analysts assert that both the Exxon Valdez and the Deepwater Horizon
disasters were avoidable and that the same industry and government failures to address
risk management characterized both events.2
Stephen Haycox is a distinguished professor of history at the University of Alaska Anchorage. He thanks Brian
Davies, formerly of BP, for his helpful counsel.
Readers may contact Haycox at [email protected].
1
Riki Ott, Not One Drop: Betrayal and Courage in the Wake of the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill (White River Junction,
2008). Critics have identified discrepancies in Exxon Mobil Corporation’s computation of lost oil. See “State of Exxon
Valdez Oil Spill Remains Disputed,” Anchorage Daily News, June 6, 2010, p. B10. “Status of Injured Resources and Services,” May 2010, Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Trustee Council, http://www.evostc.state.ak.us/recovery/status.cfm; “Exxon Valdez
Oil Spill,” Encyclopedia of Earth, http://www.eoearth.org/article/Exxon_Valdez_oil_spill?topic=58075; “Exxon Valdez Oil
Spill Press Releases and Reports,” U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, http://www.epa.gov/history/topics/valdez.
2
National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling, Deep Water: The Gulf Oil
Disaster and the Future of Offshore Drilling (Washington, 2011), vi; Campbell Robertson and Clifford Krauss, “Gulf
Spill Is the Largest of Its Kind, Scientists Say,” New York Times, Aug. 2, 2010, p. A6.
doi: 10.1093/jahist/jas050
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June 2012
The Journal of American History
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When the Exxon Valdez eased away from the Alaska oil pipeline terminal at Valdez,
Alaska, on the night of March 23, 1989, ostensibly there was no reason to expect its
voyage through Prince William Sound into the Gulf of Alaska and on to Long Beach,
California, would be anything but routine. The skipper, Capt. Joseph Hazelwood, was a
twenty-one-year veteran of oil tankers, and the ship was nearly new. Yet, just as surely, the
Exxon Valdez carried with it into Prince William Sound the inevitability of just the kind
of disaster that befell the ship. Ironically, a local marine biologist earlier the same evening
had told a meeting of concerned citizens that it was not a question of whether there would
be a tanker spill in the Sound, but when. As noted in the final report of the Alaska Oil
Spill Commission (aosc), established to investigate the spill, the disaster was preventable.
The system of oversight and regulation, put in place at the beginning of production and
shipment of oil from Alaska’s North Slope, failed, as did the system’s later revisions.3
The photographs and video of the grounded tanker filling the blue sea around it with
black oil still circulate in electronic media, recalling the shock and outrage initially generated by the spill. Now iconic, those images point to the irresponsibility of the global oil
industry in failing to heed the lessons extracted from the event by experts who analyzed
the causes and consequences of the spill.
Official investigations found that the Exxon Valdez spill was a result of “bad seamanship, bad management and bad luck.” The aosc chair Walter B. Parker wrote that the
disaster could have been prevented “by an advanced oil transportation system designed to
minimize human error” and if “Alaskans, state and federal governments, the oil industry
and the American public had insisted on stringent safeguards.” That finding is arresting in
light of the conclusions of the National Commission on the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill
and Offshore Drilling in its final report to the president, issued January 11, 2011. “The
Deepwater Horizon blowout, explosion and oil spill did not have to happen,” the report
asserts. “Without effective government oversight the offshore oil and gas industry will not
adequately reduce the risk of accidents, nor prepare effectively to respond to emergencies.”
But that alone will not be enough. Government oversight “must be accompanied by the
oil and gas industry’s reinvention: sweeping reforms that accomplish no less than a fundamental transformation of its safety culture.” The findings mirror the risk management
lessons that the National Transportation Safety Board (ntsb), the aosc, and the Alaska
Department of Environmental Conservation urged should have been learned from the
Exxon Valdez spill. A comparison of the disasters suggests that the lessons were not heeded.4
Human Error and Corporate Culpability
The lessons urged on industry and government by analysts of the Exxon Valdez spill were
neither complex nor obscure. Examining the history of disaster preparedness and risk
management in Alaska, the aosc found that initial safeguards for shipping had been
3
Sharon Bushnell and Stan Jones, The Spill: Personal Stories from the Exxon Valdez Disaster (Kenmore, 2009),
164; Alaska Oil Spill Commission, Spill. The Wreck of the Exxon Valdez: Implications for Safe Transport of Oil
(Anchorage, 1990), iii–v; Art Davidson, In the Wake of the Exxon Valdez: The Devastating Impact of the Alaska Oil
Spill (San Francisco, 1990).
4
Ernest Piper, The Exxon Valdez Oil Spill: Final Report, State of Alaska Response (Anchorage, 1993), 1; National
Transportation Safety Board, The Grounding of the Tankship Exxon Valdez on Bligh Reef, Prince William Sound
(Washington, 1990), 1–4; Alaska Oil Spill Commission, Spill, iv; National Commission on the BP Deepwater
Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling, Deep Water, 215–17; Deepwater Horizon commissioner Frances Ulmer to
Stephen Haycox, April 8, 2011, e-mail (in Stephen Haycox’s possession).
Unlearned Lessons from the Exxon Valdez
221
relaxed, and contingency response capability had been seriously compromised by industry and government obstruction and complacency. Recent research suggests that executive agreements to relax safety standards reached by representatives of organizations
utilizing advanced technology for resource development amount to collusion. The case of
the Exxon Valdez may be better understood as a state-facilitated crime in which decisions
taken by several organizations made the grounding a likely outcome.” In the words of the
aosc report,
Today’s error-inducing system usually advances human error as the explanation for an
accident. That argument effectively closes off any detailed analysis of the system itself
by shifting the blame to the most convenient individual available, either the master,
the watch officer or both. Blame is not attached to overall company policy that may
have led to the accident—such as excessive work hours leading to officer and crew
fatigue, route shortcuts to save time, and a general misunderstanding in the maritime
industry of the overall advantages, disadvantages and effects of automation.5
The law, regulations, and contingency plans put in place as the pipeline was being
constructed during the 1970s contained remarkably prescient insight into the potential
hazards of transporting oil in Prince William Sound. In 1976 the Alaska legislature
adopted a comprehensive set of measures that gave the state wide-ranging authority to
regulate design, equipment, navigation, operation, certification, inspection, financial
responsibility, assignment of oil-spill liability, cleanup capability, and responsibility for
tankers entering Alaskan waters.6
The oil industry interpreted these parameters as constraints and in 1979 filed suit in
federal court to invalidate them, charging intrusion on federal jurisdiction. Federal courts
agreed that the state laws and regulations were unconstitutional. The invalidated state
measures provided for double-hulled tankers, gave the state the authority to establish
maximum working hours and mandated rest periods for ship personnel, instituted conditions for navigating crowded shipping lanes, set minimum deployment times for cleanup
equipment and operations, and dictated the kinds and amounts of equipment to be kept
on hand in case of a spill—all principal elements in the Exxon Valdez incident. The lax
federal oversight transferred much responsibility to the operating companies: Exxon, the
Chevron Shipping Company, and the Alyeska Pipeline Service Company. In the meantime Alyeska developed its own, much weaker contingency plan. After the 1984 federal
decision, Exxon notified the state of Alaska that “For most tanker spills, the response plan
outlined in the Alyeska plan will suffice. However, in the event of a major spill by an
Exxon owned and operated vessel, it is anticipated that the Exxon Company, U.S.A. Oil
Spill Response Team . . . would be activated to manage the spill response.”7
The aosc and the results of the ntsb investigation established the circumstances of the
Exxon Valdez grounding. Guided out of the Valdez Marine Terminal by the port pilot, the
ship departed carrying a normal cargo of about 53 million gallons of oil. As provided by
the regulations then in place, the port pilot did not escort the ship as far as Bligh Reef,
a salient departure from the state’s original plan. Shortly after the port pilot hand-off,
5
Tricia Cruciotti and Rick A. Matthews, “The Exxon Valdez Oil Spill,” in State Corporate Crime: Wrongdoing at
the Intersection of Business and Government, ed. Raymond J. Michalowski and Ronald C. Kramer (New Brunswick,
2006), 157–59; Piper, Exxon Valdez Oil Spill, 113.
6
Alaska Oil Spill Commission, Spill, 44; 1976 Alaska Statute Sec. 46.03.750(e) (1976).
7
Chevron U.S.A., Inc. v. Hammond, 726 F.2d 483 (1984); Alaska Oil Spill Commission, Spill, 47. Alyeska
Pipeline Service Company, Oil Spill Contingency Plan, Valdez Terminal, January 1980 (Anchorage, 1980).
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June 2012
Captain Hazelwood left the bridge to go to his cabin, a violation of U.S. Coast Guard
regulations and Exxon Shipping Company policy for constricted waters. That left the
ship under the command of the third mate and his helmsman, who was an unqualified
able seaman—yet another maritime violation. Exxon Shipping Company had reduced
the number of crew on its Alaska tankers, arguing that automation of many procedures
justified the measure. That decision increased officers’ work hours and allowed less time
for rest, resulting in chronic fatigue. The ntsb findings were highly critical of bridge command among the Exxon fleet: “The Safety Board considers the reduced manning practices
of the Exxon Shipping Company generally incautious and without apparent justification
from the standpoint of safety. The financial advantage derived . . . does not seem to justify
incurring the foreseeable risks of serious accident.”8
Another contributing factor to the disaster was the relaxing of traffic system regulations for tanker movement. The helmsman piloted the Exxon Valdez out of the designated
shipping lane because of icebergs. The detour took the ship near Bligh Reef, which was
submerged but lighted. The reef would not have been a navigation challenge if the ship
had been properly rerouted back toward the shipping channel. The mate did not order the
course change and the helmsman did not execute a course change on his own, and after
twenty minutes on the errant course the ship grounded on the reef, shredding three of its
eleven cargo tanks and puncturing five more. Hazelwood radioed the coast guard traffic
center at Valdez: “We’re fetched up, ah, hard aground . . . evidently leaking some oil.”9
At the time of the grounding, the state of Alaska and the U.S. Coast Guard had in
place a revised traffic management plan along with reduced contingencies in case of a
tanker spill. The plan mandated that tankers moving through ice in Prince William Sound
must slow and stay in the designated channels. Monitoring and enforcement of those
rules had been lax, however, with the coast guard routinely allowing detours. Slowing the
vessels meant increased voyage time and consequently reduced profits—the principal
consideration cited in seeking exceptions to the regulations.10
Much speculation has centered on whether alcohol consumption by Hazelwood
contributed to the accident. By his own admission he had in the past boarded vessels as
mate or master while intoxicated, and in federal court he pled no contest to drinking
liquor within four hours of taking command of the Exxon Valdez. The ntsb concluded
that “Exxon should have removed the master from seagoing employment until there was
ample proof that he had his alcohol problem under control.”11
The aosc placed the captain’s performance in the broader context of corporate
culpability, arguing that regardless of Hazelwood’s physical and mental state before and
after the accident, the grounding “represents much more than the error of a possibly
drunken skipper: it was the result of the gradual degradation of oversight and safety
8
National Transportation Safety Board, Grounding of the Tankship Exxon Valdez on Bligh Reef, 1–4. Alaska
Oil Spill Commission, Spill, appendix F. Human error is cited as a cause in 80% of marine accidents. See
Anita M. Rothblum, “Human Error and Marine Safety,” http://www.bowles-langley.com/wp-content/files_mf/
humanerrorandmarinesafety26.pdf.
9
Alaska Oil Spill Commission, Spill, 13.
10
Ibid., iv.
11
John Keeble, Out of the Channel: The Exxon Valdez Oil Spill in Prince William Sound (Cheney, 1999), 36–40,
50–52. Joseph Hazelwood’s blood alcohol level ten hours after the grounding was 50% above the maximum allowed
by the U.S. Coast Guard. The blood samples taken from him were mishandled by the transporter or the analyzing
laboratory, contributing to his acquittal on a subsequent state charge of operating a vessel while intoxicated. See
National Transportation Safety Board, Grounding of the Tankship Exxon Valdez on Bligh Reef, 5.
Unlearned Lessons from the Exxon Valdez
223
practices that had been intended to safeguard and backstop the inevitable mistakes of
human beings.”12
The reports from the aosc and the ntsb provided useful evidence and argumentation
for new congressional legislation to mitigate the conditions that led to the Exxon Valdez
spill. The Oil Pollution Act of 1990 mandates an Incident Command System and requires
vessels to submit to the Environmental Protection Agency plans for dealing with such
accidents. In addition, the U.S. Coast Guard revised its oversight of tanker traffic in
Prince William Sound. The pollution act requires that by 2015 all tankers entering the
Sound must be outfitted with a double hull. Estimates suggest that if the Exxon Valdez
had been a double-hulled vessel, the spill would have been reduced by half. However,
most of the act’s requirements are site specific to Prince William Sound. The experience
of BP with the Deepwater Horizon rig suggests that, as the National Commission on the
Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling report noted, safety is not yet an oil
industry–wide priority, conceivably a criminal failing.13
Governmental Entanglement
Analysts tend to agree that once the ship grounded on Bligh Reef, the company, federal,
and state responses to the accident were failures, exacerbating a disaster that might have
been significantly mitigated had various agencies worked together within the framework
of an adequate, comprehensive, coordinated, and enforced plan. In the first hours after
the spill, the principal responder was the Alyeska Pipeline Service Company, monitored
by the coast guard. However, the company’s spill response barge was being refitted, so it
was out of service. Much of the other response equipment designated for emergencies was
missing or buried under several feet of snow. Understaffed and underequipped, the
Alyeska Pipeline Service Company was overwhelmed. Alaska governor Steve Cowper later
commented, “one thing that angered me more than just about anything was the fact that
no effort whatsoever was being made to clean up. I blamed Alyeska.”14
Because of Alyeska’s incapacity, Exxon, which had both legal and financial liability for
the accident, took control of the response. That action was one of the most significant
developments of the disaster. Subsequent analysts would criticize the hand-off of responsibility to Exxon, a move that had not been explicitly provided for in the revised response
plans approved by the coast guard and the state of Alaska. Confusion over federal, state,
and company responsibility was a constant problem and a source of confusion during the
12
Alaska Oil Spill Commission, Spill, 7. For his conviction for the negligent discharge of oil, Hazelwood paid
a $50,000 fine and completed 1,000 hours of community service. He has not found permanent work as a vessel
captain since the grounding.
13
Oil Pollution Act, 33 U.S.C. sec. 270 (1990). On the Oil Pollution Act, see Office of Emergency Management, “Oil Pollution Act Overview,” United States Environmental Protection Agency, http://www.epa.gov/osweroe1/
content/lawsregs/opaover.htm; and Russell V. Randle, Oil Pollution Deskbook (Washington, 1991). “Statement of
Admiral J. William Kime on the Prince William Sound Oil Spill before the Committee on Merchant Marine and
Fisheries, House of Representatives,” March 24, 1993, United States Department of Transportation, http://testimony
.ost.dot.gov/test/pasttest/93test/kime1.pdf; Zygmunt Plater et al., Recommendations for an Improved Oil Spill
Prevention Regulatory System: Legal Research Report (Fairbanks, 1989); “Exxon Valdez: Long-Term Effects from
Residual Oil,” U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, http://www.epa.gov/oem/docs/oil/fss/fss02/ricepresent.pdf;
Piper, Exxon Valdez Oil Spill, 113; Davidson, In the Wake of the Exxon Valdez.
14
On the immediate response to the disaster, see Alaska Oil Spill Commission, Spill, 15–28; and Bushnell and
Jones, Spill, 41.
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June 2012
cleanup, made worse by Exxon contracting with a private company to supply most of the
labor and much of the material support.15
Interagency and federal and state jurisdictional distrust also characterized the response
to the Deepwater Horizon disaster. The coast guard had surface responsibility while the
federal Minerals Management Service had source jurisdiction over the Macondo prospect
on the sea floor. Both agencies believed that they had a positive working relationship with
BP, but not everyone in government shared that view. At a press conference with several
senior administration officials, U.S. Coast Guard rear admiral Sally Brice-O’Hara referred
to BP as “our partner,” prompting Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano to
emphasize, “They are not our partner.” Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar later said
on cnn that the government would keep its “boot on the neck” of BP. Jurisdictional
competition also led to a poor response to the fire on the drilling rig. No agency knew
who was in control, leading to unnecessary delays in the deployment of equipment.16
When the Exxon Valdez ran aground in Alaska, the task of sorting out responsibility
was superseded by the fact that without equipment, little could be done to stem the
disaster. The most egregious problem was the lack of appropriate oil containment boom.
Oil began to spread away slowly from the vessel even as Exxon frantically went about
procuring boom from around the world. Moreover, there was in place no agreement on
the use of chemical dispersants, which fishermen feared would result in serious long-term
contamination.17
The storm on the evening of March 26, 1989, turned much of the spilled oil to mousse
and accelerated its spread into the Sound and out into the Gulf of Alaska. In this situation, neither chemical dispersants nor burning were options. For three days the seas had
been mostly calm, yet almost no oil was corralled or collected. The storm then took it out
of anyone’s reach. As with the Deepwater Horizon event twenty-two years later, technical
and organizational responses that were supposed to handle the emergency did not do so,
and interested parties—as well as the nation—could do little except stand by and watch.18
The storm deposited oil on beaches and bluffs and in waters teeming with wildlife. As
the oil spread from the ship, it engulfed sea otters, seals, and sea lions. When it reached
the beaches, the oil was repeatedly swept in and out of hundreds of coves, bays, and inlets
by tidal action. At that point, the challenge became collecting the dead animal life and
cleaning the shores of the many islands and the mainland—a chore that would involve
thousands of people, would take far longer than anticipated, and would result in controversy that remains unresolved over twenty years later.19
Exxon bore responsibility for the disposal of soiled cleanup materials and for remediation. Initially, the company refused to utilize local labor, including hundreds of fishermen
who knew the area, on the grounds that special expertise was needed. The locals grew
increasingly frustrated watching the oil spread with no effort being made to contain it and
Piper, Exxon Valdez Oil Spill, 10–12, 28–43, 137–54.
National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling, Deep Water, 136, 130.
United States Environmental Protection Agency Office of Emergency and Remedial Response, Understanding
Oil Spills and Oil Spill Response (Washington, 2001), 38; National Academy of Sciences, “Oil Spill Dispersants,”
InFocus, 5 (Summer 2005), http://www.infocusmagazine.org/5.2/env_oil_spill.html.
18
John R. Harrald, Ruth Cohn, and William A. Wallace, “‘We Were Always Reorganizing’: Some Crisis
Management Implications of the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill,” Organization and Environment, 6 (Sept. 1992), 197–217.
19
John F. Piatt et al., “Immediate Impact of the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill on Marine Birds,” Auk, 107 (April 1990),
387–97; David L. Garshelis, “Sea Otter Mortality Estimated from Collection of Carcasses after the Exxon Valdez
Oil Spill,” Conservation Biology, 11 (Aug. 1997), 905–16.
15
16
17
Unlearned Lessons from the Exxon Valdez
225
having their offers of aid rebuffed. Twenty-one years later residents along the Gulf Coast
from Louisiana to Florida experienced the same helplessness watching BP and its subcontractors deal with the oil leaking from the Macondo prospect. While BP developed the
Vessels of Opportunity Program to enlist the help of local residents, the corporation was
slow to develop eligibility requirements and careless about ensuring that mariners and
workers directly affected by the spill were hired to work on cleanup. Anger over the hiring
of nonlocals led the state of Louisiana and several individual parishes to establish their
own programs.20
In Alaska in 1989 it soon became apparent that Exxon had no plan for shore cleanup
and that it would be a far more formidable task than first imagined. By the middle of
April Exxon had contracted with VECO Corporation to hire and deploy workers to begin
the cleanup, which would be monitored by both the U.S. Coast Guard and representatives of the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation. Blurry lines of authority
complicated the work at every juncture, however. There were no clear definitions of what
constituted a “clean” beach, what methods of cleaning were best, which areas had priority,
or who had jurisdiction to move or not move work crews. Both Exxon and VECO
included gag rules in their contracts, prohibiting workers from talking to the press about
their activities. In late April, manifesting state and federal frustration with Exxon’s
performance, the Pacific region commander of the coast guard took over as the federal
coordinator and reorganized the work, bringing greater order to the cleanup chaos.
The necessity of implementing federal organizational control during the crisis underscored the complacency and lack of planning that were common prior to the spill and
pointed to the need for clarifying lines of authority and salient definitions before future
accidents.21
The same confusion over authority and responsibility plagued the Deepwater Horizon
spill. The commissioners who investigated that spill found that the Minerals Management Service had been lax in monitoring the Gulf operations of BP, allowing substitutions and work force diminutions that constituted threats to safety and performance. At
the same time, BP personnel were similarly careless about risk and safety. For example,
when the spill occurred, the commissioners found that BP “had no available, tested technique to stop a deepwater blowout other than the lengthy process of drilling a relief well.”
Despite knowing the risks, the corporation placed its confidence in the judgment that the
blowout preventer on the Macondo wellhead would perform correctly and that any accident on the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig would be contained on the sea surface. Those
assumptions were tragically misplaced. As did the Alaska oil-spill investigators in 1989,
the Deepwater Horizon commissioners concluded that the root cause of the 2010 disaster
was more than poor risk management by the corporation; it was, instead, inadequate
“efforts to expand regulatory oversight, tighten safety requirements, and provide funding
to equip regulators with the resources, personnel, and training needed to be effective.”
These efforts, the commissioners found, were “either overtly resisted or not supported by
industry, members of Congress, and several administrations.”22
20
Bushnell and Jones, Spill, 165; National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore
Drilling, Deep Water, 140–41.
21
Keeble, Out of the Channel, 95; Piper, Exxon Valdez Oil Spill, 43; Alaska Oil Spill Commission, Spill,
161–68.
22
National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling, Deep Water, 126–27,
135–36.
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June 2012
In Alaska, cleanup operations continued throughout the summer of 1989. Exxon
returned to continue cleanup work in the summers of 1990 and 1991, after which time
the local federal coordinator declared the job complete. Whether the oil had been cleaned
up was open to interpretation. Many areas appeared to be free of oil but much had sunk
below the ground, particularly on cobbled or rocky beaches where removal had been
more difficult.23
Few felt that the spill had been mitigated satisfactorily. Research over twenty years has
demonstrated that substantial oil remains in the mid- and lower intertidal zones. Blood
tests on otters and other mammals show elevated levels of hydrocarbons, as do tests on
clams, mussels, and other species. The research has ultimately generated a new appreciation
of the length of time required for dissipation of spilled oil in a natural environment.
Analysts debate the effects of the toxicity of the remaining oil. While some species have
recovered, many have not.24
Lasting Consequences
One of the more tragic consequences of the corporate resistance to tight standards for risk
management in handling Alaska oil prior to the Exxon Valdez spill has been to humans.
That cost was substantial, and it continues. Valdez, a community of about one thousand
residents, swelled to an estimated eight thousand as people came to help or for jobs, and
as journalists and writers descended from across the world. The pay for common labor
was high, and many locals contracted for use of their boats. Though some residents
refused to work for Exxon or its contractors, the fast-flowing money was hard to resist.25
Circumstances were similar in Cordova, Prince William Sound’s major fishing port.
While the community was spared direct contact with the oil, the livelihoods of nearly all
of its residents depended on resources in the Sound that had been inundated by the oil.
The divide between those who were willing to work on the cleanup and those who were
not drove a wedge into a community that had enjoyed a sense of solidarity. “It created a
lot of animosity between people, and that’s a hard thing in a community the size of
Cordova,” said Marilyn Leland, the executive director of the local fishermen’s union. The
resulting stress led to alcohol, drugs, spousal abuse, and related problems. Two researchers
argue that the stress is chronic and represents a need for government to recognize and
evaluate human stress in resource-dependent communities when technological disasters
occur. One fisherman who could no longer make a living told interviewers, “I felt like
I was worthless. Without counseling I might have taken my life.” Another said she had to
23
The Exxon Corporation spent $2 billion on the cleanup, for which it received acknowledgement and forgiveness of a portion of the criminal fine assessed for violation of several federal statutes. See J. Steven Picou, “The
‘Talking Circle’ as Sociological Practice: Cultural Transformation of Chronic Disaster Impacts,” Sociological Practice:
A Journal of Clinical and Applied Sociology, 2 (June 2000), 77–97; and Brian M. Owen et al., The Economics of a
Disaster: The Exxon Valdez Oil Spill (Westport, 1995).
24
Stanley D. Rice et al., “The Effects of the Exxon Valdez Spill on the Alaska Coastal Environment” in
Symposium 18: Proceedings of the Exxon Valdez Symposium, Held in Anchorage, Alaska, February 2–5, 1993, ed.
Stanley D. Rice et al. (Bethesda, 1996), 1–18; “Oil Remains: The Persistence, Toxicity, and Impact of Exxon Valdez
Oil,” Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Trustee Council, http://www.evostc.state.ak.us/recovery/lingeringoil.cfm. A complete
list of nonrecovered species is available at “Status of Injured Resources and Services.”
25
Sociological studies of the human impact of the spill include J. Steven Picou and Duane A. Gill, “The Exxon
Valdez Oil Spill and Chronic Psychological Stress,” in Symposium 18, ed. Rice et al., 879–93; and Kathleen J. Tierney
and E. L. Quarantelli, “Social Aspects of the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill,” Organization and Environment, 23 (Dec. 2010),
167–73.
Unlearned Lessons from the Exxon Valdez
227
move from Cordova because the atmosphere there became toxic. “If I had stayed, I don’t
think I would have lived.”26
Several native communities with residents who relied heavily on subsistence harvesting
of traditional Sound resources suffered significantly from the spill. One village council
president told an interviewer, “We fish, hunt, and trap. We eat deer, fish, clams, urchins,
almost anything that tastes good. It’s been our lifestyle for years. To have it suddenly
jerked out from under us like this by an oil company causes a lot of hurt.”27
The same stress-related dysfunctions that afflicted residents of Valdez and Cordova
affected native villagers. One man declared, “I was right there. We picked up dying
animals, tried to capture dying birds. . . . Everything was dying. If you would have seen
this, you would have cried, like I did. My heart was heavy; a piece of me died out there.”28
While research continues, early conclusions support the finding that similar stress
reactions characterize responses to the Deepwater Horizon disaster among Gulf Coast
residents. That spill caused extensive damage to marine life and habitats and to the fishing
and tourism industries of the region. Various fisheries were closed soon after the spill, and
some that were subsequently opened were reclosed in response to continuing pollution
or contamination discovered later. Uncertainty over the future has exacerbated the
sociological impact.29
The litigation generated by the Exxon Valdez spill resulted in another significant enduring human impact. In a plea agreement on the criminal charges, Exxon was fined $150
million, the largest fine ever imposed for an environmental crime. The court forgave $125
million of that fine in recognition of Exxon’s cooperation in cleaning up the spill and in
paying certain private claims. As restitution for the injuries caused to the fish, wildlife,
and lands of the spill region, Exxon agreed to pay $100 million. In a separate civil settlement, Exxon agreed to pay $900 million with annual payments stretched over a ten-year
period. Three-fourths of the civil settlement was paid to a newly created joint federal-state
entity, the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Trustee Council, directed by three federal and three
state trustees. The money is to be used for restoration of damaged Alaska habitat.30
In 1990 attorneys for plaintiffs also filed a class action on behalf of 3,400 fishermen,
boat owners, natives, local governments, and others seeking restitution for damages
resulting from the spill. This case has become notorious for the length of time taken to
reach a conclusion. Initially, a jury awarded the plaintiffs $5 billion—an amount described
by the presiding judge as “breath-taking.” Exxon appealed, eventually to the U.S. Supreme
Court, resulting in a reduction of the award to $507 million, one tenth of the original
jury decision. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals subsequently determined that Exxon
26
“About Us,” Cordova District Fishermen United, http://www.cdfu.org/about.html; Former Cordova mayor
Margie Johnson interview by Haycox, Oct. 4, 2010, transcript (in Haycox’s possession); Bushnell and Jones, Spill,
216; Picou and Gill, “Exxon Valdez Oil Spill and Chronic Psychological Stress,” 884; Bushnell and Jones, Spill, 271,
225, 231.
27
Keeble, Out of the Channel, 75; Alaska Oil Spill Commission, Spill, 71.
28
Picou, “‘Talking Circle’ as Sociological Practice,” 87, 94.
29
Stu Hutson, “Fight for Subject Confidentiality Threatens Disaster Research,” Nature Medicine, 16 (Aug.
2010), 842.
30
Former Alaska governor Walter Hickel interview by Haycox, July 15, 2010, transcript (in Haycox’s possession); United States v. Exxon Corp., No. A91-082-CV (D. Alaska, Oct. 8, 1991), http://www.arlis.org/docs/
vol1/A/42964164.pdf; State of Alaska v. Exxon Corp. and Exxon Shipping Co., No. A91-083-CV (D. Alaska, Oct. 9,
1991), http://www.arlis.org/docs/vol1/A/294858686.pdf; “A State and Federal Partnership,” Exxon Valdez Oil Spill
Trustee Council, http://www.evostc.state.ak.us/people/tc.cfm.
228
The Journal of American History
June 2012
was required to pay interest on the $507 million, bringing the total award to about
$1 billion.31
Lasting over twenty years, the Exxon case became noted as an egregious postponement
of justice. Chief Justice John Roberts acknowledged that the length of time required for
the litigation was “troubling.” The delay contributed to both the image of the Exxon
Corporation as an insensitive and greedy entity and to the image of the Supreme Court
as an ally in the injustice.32
Conclusion
The Exxon Valdez oil spill has entered American cultural consciousness as an iconic
cataclysm. In journalistic accounts of the Deepwater Horizon blowout, the Exxon Valdez
was used repeatedly as a bench mark against which to measure the scope of the Gulf of
Mexico tragedy. On the surface, the Exxon Valdez event is understood as an environmental
disaster traceable to corporate resistance to responsible risk management and now linked
to collusion by the judicial system. As one respondent noted, an oil spill is an emotional
event, “saturated in blame.” As a result, “oil soaked birds and fish come to symbolize a
reviled industry’s heedless behavior.”33
Yet as the report of the Deepwater Horizon Commissioners indicates, the risk management system in place in 2010 did not prevent the preventable tragedy in the Gulf of
Mexico. BP manifested the oil industry’s same lack of attention to safety and prevention
shown by Exxon in Alaska in 1989. And the federal government, despite its responsibility
to monitor potentially hazardous resource development projects and despite the Incident
Command System provided for in the 1990 Oil Pollution Act, failed to oversee BP’s
activities in the Gulf. The cautions urged in Deep Water bear an uncanny and uncomfortable resemblance to the caustic conclusions of the aosc twenty-two years earlier. That
similarity suggests a substantive, continuing policy failure by the oil industry regarding
risk management. It remains to be seen if the forceful recommendations of the Deepwater
Horizon Commission will have any significant affect on policy formulation and on the
prevention of and industry response to future environmental disasters.
31
In re Exxon Valdez, No. A89-0095-CV (9th Cir. Jan. 28, 2004); Judge H. Russell Holland, public remarks on
In re Exxon Valdez, Aug. 22, 2010, notes (in Haycox’s possession); David Lebedoff, Cleaning Up: The Story behind
the Biggest Legal Bonanza of Our Time (New York, 1997); Joseph J. Chambers, “In re Exxon Valdez: Application of
Due Process Constraints on Punitive Damage Awards,” Alaska Law Review, 20 (Dec. 2003), 195–212.
32
Chief Justice John Roberts, response to Stephen Haycox question, visitor’s session, U.S. Supreme Court
chambers, May 28, 2009.
33
Raffi Khatchadourian, “The Gulf War: Were There Any Heroes in the BP Oil Disaster?,” New Yorker, March
14, 2011, pp. 37–59, esp. 39–40.