Fish and Invertebrate Kill Events in the Northern Gulf of Mexico: Observational Data from Louisiana, Florida and Federal waters near Mississippi between September 2010 and February 2011.

This report contains data related to fish and invertebrate kill events (observable acute responses to local stressors) in the northern Gulf of Mexico and provides additional context for the posted dataset, including information about the collection, analysis, and organization of the data. Characteristics of this dataset include the following: • The dataset characterizes reported fish kill events, including the location, species and number of fish present, physical condition of the species present, water and weather conditions, and physiochemical properties of the water at the site. • This dataset includes data collected cooperatively with the Trustees. • Before posting, extensive work was done independently by BP contractors to verify some aspects of the posted data (e.g., positional coordinates and field data). The focus of this data posting is observational data collected during investigation of reported fish and invertebrate kill events in the northern Gulf of Mexico. Observations were made at six locations distributed in coastal Louisiana (Fourchon Beach, Bay Robinson, Bay Bastien, Pelican Island), the federal waters south of Petit Bois Island, Mississippi, and Perdido Key, Florida between September 16, 2010, and February 16, 2011, under a work plan titled Investigative Plan for Fish and Invertebrate Kills in the Northern Gulf of Mexico. This work was conducted as part of NRDA studies agreed to and executed cooperatively by National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and BP. The following types of data are included in the dataset: observation date, observation location, notes regarding the species and number of fish present and their condition, water and weather conditions, and physiochemical properties of the water at the site. Sampling intensity varied across incidents: • The Bay Bastien incident is characterized by over 400 rows of information which describe site characteristics, physiochemical characterization of the site, the fish present, and their condition. • The Fourchon Beach incident is characterized in fewer than 10 rows which include a general incident description and 4 physiochemical measures. • The remaining incident characterizations are limited to a general incident descriptions embedded in one or two rows each. In addition to the cross-incident variation noted above, sampling variations may exist across observers, methods, locations, and times.