Getting ready to mop up oil in the beautiful waters of the Bahamas, the U.S. Coast Guard is practicing its response to a future oil spill off the Florida Keys.
Addressing potential risks from exploratory drilling underway in Cuban waters and similar development planned in the Bahamas, Coast Guard officials say the exercise will test updates to their regional plan for responding to oil spills off Florida’s island chain.
In the exercise, oil from a fictitious drilling platform in the Florida Straits threatens to reach the Keys.
Officials say U.S. federal, state and local authorities plan to use lessons learned during the 2010 Deepwater Horizon spill in the Gulf of Mexico to update their oil spill response plans.
Wildlife agencies, law enforcement, researchers and fishermen’s associations are joining the Coast Guard in the exercise.
It is not clear if Bahamian groups are involved in the triaing or planning.
