AN APPROACH TO EVALUATE THE APPLICATION OF THE VULNERABILITY INDEX FOR OIL-SPILLS IN TROPICAL RED-SEA ENVIRONMENTS

The Egyptian national marine oil pollution contingency plan was urgent ly initiated after the Nabila oil spill in 1982, to provide an estimat e of its environmental effects on the Egyptian Red Sea coastal areas a nd to determine geomorphological features and coastal processes, toget her with physical, chemical and biological baseline data for this trop ical environment. The 'Vulnerability Index' (VT) was applied to evalua te and calibrate the effect of the Nabila oil spill on the Egyptian Re d Sea Coastal area. A detailed in situ coastal survey was conducted du ring two visits in November 1982 and May 1983 to 80 shore sites from S uez to Ras Banas to monitor the oil pollution and to apply the 'Vulner ability Index'. A comparative assessment of the index over time by com paring it with a quick ground inspection in November 1993 to some site s to evaluate the applicability of this index for oil spills in such e nvironments. In addition, the physical effects of fresh and weathered crude oil and/with dispersant on water filtration by different beaches were preliminary studied. The geomorphological/Vulnerability Index re sults show that most of the Egyptian Red Sea coastal environments have medium to high vulnerability to immediate and medium term oil spill d amage. The oil pollution spread estimated to be 250 km south of the oi l spill and about 200 km north of it. The quantity of oil along the sh oreline was reduced by about 60% due to natural and authorities clean up. The third survey after 11 years showed that the VI could be used a s a predictive tool for assessment of oil spill effects on such tropic al environments. Copyright (C) 1996 Elsevier Science Ltd.