The explosion on the British Petroleum-leased drilling rig Deepwater Horizon on April 20, 2010, killed 11 workers and started a flood of crude oil into the Gulf of Mexico. As the slick grew over the weeks that followed and BP struggled to cap the well and deal with mounting outrage, attention shifted from the accident itself to the massive environmental impact of the gooey brown plumes gushing from the ocean floor a mile deep. That impact is likely to extend far beyond what is apparent on the surface or in the marshlands and estuaries of the Gulf Coast; the oil's effect on fragile underwater ecosystems could be truly catastrophic. Here are some of the most visible potential and real victims of the disaster.
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