Maggie: Happy Monday! It is April, 20. I am Maggie Rulli and Channel One News starts right now!
Let's start off with headlines and first up, we begin in Oklahoma where hundreds gathered yesterday to remember the Oklahoma City bombing, a terror attack on U.S. soil that twenty years ago claimed the lives of more than 100 Americans.
On April 19, 1995, a massive explosion ripped through the Murrah federal building in Oklahoma City killing 168 people, including 19 children.
At the time it was the worst terror attack on U.S. soil.
Yesterday loved ones of the victims and survivors of the bombing attended the solemn ceremony held at the Oklahoma City National Memorial and Museum, which was built on the site where the federal building once stood.
President Bill Clinton attended the ceremony and praised the people of Oklahoma for their resilience.
President Bill Clinton: You had to choose to affirm our common humanity in the face of mad, crazy people who think the differences are all that matter enough to dehumanize innocent bystanders they never met.
Maggie: Timothy Mcveigh was executed in 2001 for setting off the explosion. He was an army veteran with anti-government views and a homegrown terrorist.
Next up, tragedy struck this weekend off the coast of Libya where boat packed with people fleeing from Africa flipped over, bringing to light just how desperate refugees are to find a better life.
More than 700 people were on board and traveling illegally, hoping to make it to Europe. Hundreds are believed to be dead, and this could be the deadliest incident on record.
Thousands of Africans try to make it across the Mediterranean Sea every year in dangerous makeshift boats. Many are fleeing from violence in their home countries and looking for jobs and stability.
Coming up, five years after the Gulf oil spill we look at the environmental and human impact.
This week, we stop and take notice of Earth Week, a week of environmental awareness and respect for our planet. But, five years ago todaythat respect was put to the test when an oil rig exploded in the Gulf of Mexico, creating an oil spill so big that people are still seeing the effects of it today.
I traveled to the Coast of Louisiana to see for myself how the spill still affects the region.
Robert Collins: I had an American dream, a South Louisiana dream, but an American Dream. To be part of this industry, to own my own shrimp dock, and it's questionable now. And that just breaks my heart. It’s almost like my American Dream is dying.
Maggie: Robert Collins was 16 when the deep water horizon oil rig exploded in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010,killing 11 workers and unleashing a spew of oil that gushed for 87 days, dumping more than 200 million gallons of oil into the ocean.
It was the largest environmental disaster in United States history. Oil seeped into marshes, covered land, and smothered wildlife. Robert’s family shrimping business came to a halt.
Robert: A lot of days I saw my uncle broken up into tears, which was really hard to see.
Maggie: The images of oil drenched pelicans and water thick with oil stunned the country. Most of blame fell on BritishPetroleum, known as BP, one of the world’s largest oil and gas companies.
President Barack Obama: BP is responsible for this leak. BP will be paying the bill.
Maggie: According to BP, they have already paid $28 billion in government payments to people living in the Gulf, and on the immediate response.
A BP led cleanup effort used floating barriers, called booms, to contain the spill. Some oil was burned off, and chemicals were also used to help break it down.
Yet both those chemicals and the sheer amount of oil in the water were unprecedented. And even now, half a decade later,people still don't know their impact.
To see what it is like today we head out off the coast of Louisiana, one of the areas hit hardest by the spill, with the National Wildlife Foundation. They have been keeping a close eye on any changes to the Gulf’s ecosystem. Yet, even they are surprised by what we find.
Rebecca Triche: That’s so surprising how fast that this has happened. The deterioration is fast in the last five years. That’s just…wow.
Maggie: Cat Island was in the direct path of the spill. Its marsh and animals were completely covered by oil.
Triche: If you were to have seen it five years ago, you wouldn’t have believed that it would be this skeletal remnant of what it once was.
Maggie: The deterioration of that island, how much of that can we blame on the oil spill?
Triche: Oh you can definitely blame the oil spill for the plants dying and the roots not holding that land together anymore.
Maggie: Without its plants, the island’s very foundation began to crumble. And soon the island just faded away.
According to our boats’GPS we are supposed to be in the middle of an island right now. But that island has shrunk so much over the past five years that it is now twenty times smaller.
And even though you can’t see any oil, sometimes it is what you can’t see that might be the most damaging.
Do you think there’s still oil left in the marsh?
Triche: Oh yeah, definitely.
Maggie: How much?
Triche: I don’t know. But there’s definitely oil in the march because we could not clean it out.
Maggie: Two recent studies found evidence of an oil contaminated area roughly the size of RhodeIsland on the bottom of the ocean.
Triche: So that’s going to linger in the system for decades if not longer. There’s a lot we still need to know about the potential impact of the oil spill.
Maggie: In their annual report, the National Wild Life Foundation found that five years after the spill, many animal populations have dropped significantly, some bird species by more than 30 percent. And fish have been found with defects, showing potential contaminations in the food chain; a lasting legacy of the oil spill that is still affecting the people who live here and rely on the land.
Robert: We worry every year. Is there going to be shrimp? We know that there’s going to be some shrimp, but enough where we could make a living, where we could be happy to be in this business.
We live in fear. Once there’s one kind of economy kind of thing, it can always happen again.
Maggie: More shrimp are caught in Louisiana waters than anywhere else in the country, and the state produces around a quarter of all seafood in America.
Making a natural disaster in the Gulf, is a potential economic disaster around the country. While exact data is still unknown, five years later, local fisherman are still reporting lower numbers.
Robert: Maybe we bring in half as much shrimp, maybe a quarter of as much shrimp as we used to bring in. Which, man, it’s a real. It’s tough to see. It’s tough to go through.
Maggie: While the exact cause of this shortage is not confirmed, a disappearing ecosystem like the one we saw off the coast is certainly a factor. Yet, the lasting impact of the spill is still debated.
BP says that no long term effects have ever been proven, and the Gulf is almost back to normal. Some also point out, oil does spew naturally in the ocean from openings in the sea floor.
The government suggests that it is too soon to form conclusions either way about the health of the ocean in the Gulf.
On the coast of Louisiana, this debate is hard to ignore.
Five years after the spill and were are told that oil still commonly washes up on shore. We just came across this fresh oil patch here and if you break off a hunt, it smells like asphalt.
Whilequestions about the spill's exact impact remain, there's no arguing, the spill has left a lasting mark on the region.
And as we continue to look at how we treat Planet Earth this week, we would love to hear from you. So, are you or your school celebrating Earth Week? Well, send us your photos or videos at .
Now Keith, you know there's nothing I love more than a little competition.
Keith: Well Maggie, the annual Academic Decathlon is definitely competitive, pitting some of the nation’s brightest teens against each other in a three day battle of the smarts. And this year's competition went down in California over the weekend.
These students from California’s Granada Hills Charter High School went in hoping to reclaim the title.
They were national champions in 2011, 2012, and 2013.So the bar was high for newcomers, like Natalie Gonzales.
Natalie Gonzales: It was really intimidating at first. I wasn't sure if I could keep up with some of the returning members
Keith: Not only did she keep up, but she and her teammates shined at Friday night's Super Quiz, a jeopardy style speed test with questions that are overwhelming just to read, but not to them.
Jorge: My dad always pushed me to read books, make sure that I always stayed focused in school.
Keith: Granada Hills cleaned up, winning every major award, beating 25,000 other schools. They are the national champs, once again.
Now the students say it is time to celebrate.
Natalie: We're going to Disneyland!
Keith: And then, it is back to the books.
Granada Hills even outsmarted 10 teams from China and two from Great Britain.
Maggie: So cool. I would like to see how our newsroom stacks up.
Alright guys, that's going to do it for us. We cannot wait to see you tomorrow.
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