When will the oil make it to South Carolina’s coast? Nobody knows. Dr. Jack DiTullio, College of Charleston professor and oceanographer, communicated the difficulty of predicting which way the oil may travel. He explains how the physics of the ocean’s currents are erratic and quite complicated. Numerous scientists are working around the clock in order to predict different scenarios of oil travel. Dr. DiTullio believes that the winds would have to shift and come from the north in order for the oil to make it to South Carolina’s coast.
Dr. Louis Burnett, director of Grice Marine Laboratory and College of Charleston professor, has been named one of the College’s leading experts on the oil spill crisis. On May 18, 2010 he attended the Senate Commerce Committee in Washington, DC regarding this environmental catastrophe. Dr. Burnett expressed his concern for Charleston’s fragile marsh ecosystem, if the oil makes it further north.