(Dan Rather) An oil tanker ran aground today off the nation s northernmost ice-free port, Valdez, Alaska.

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1 Exxon Valdez (Dan Rather) An oil tanker ran aground today off the nation s northernmost ice-free port, Valdez, Alaska. (Narrator) One of the worst oil spill in US history brought Americans images of blackened beaches, dying wildlife, outrage and betrayal. (Steve Cowper, Alaska Governor) The evidence is that the response was slow and inadequate. (Narrator) Blame soon centered on the tanker captain. (Tom Brokaw) It is now clear that the captain of the tanker who was not on the bridge at the time of the accident had been drinking. (Narrator) But the accident also exposed the inattention to oil industry safety and led to promises to repair the damage that had been done. (Don Cornett, Exxon CEO) We will consider whatever it takes to keep you whole. (Narrator) And to do more to stop future spills. (President Bush) We also rededicate ourselves to transportation safety and to realistic planning for accidents that do occur. (Narrator) Nearly 25 years later, what happened to the promises made in the wake of the Exxon Valdez? (New reporter) The Gulf spill might already be three times as worse as the Exxon Valdez disaster. (Joseph Hazelwood, Exxon Valdez Captain) Uh we ve fetched up hard aground and evidently we re leaking some oil. (Narrator) Just past midnight on March 24 th, the super tanker Exxon Valdez crashed into a reef off the coast of southern Alaska. (News reporter) One of America s most magnificent waterways is blackened and befouled tonight by the biggest oil spill in American history. (News reporter) Two hundred forty thousand barrels, 11 million gallons of Alaskan crude oil, escaped from the huge vessel. (Narrator) The oil industry s response plans have promised a swift clean up in the event of a spill. But Riki Ott was alarmed when she flew over the wreck. (Riki Ott) We re nine hours after the wreck and there was not a speck of promised recovery equipment on the water. And this had all been promised within six hours and we were three hours past six hours and nothing. (Narrator) Neither Exxon nor Alyeska, the oil pipeline company in charge of the immediate response, was ready for such a large spill. (News reporter) Alyeska was supposed to have an emergency response team at its terminal in Valdez but eight years ago, the team was disbanded.

2 (Stephen Haycox, Alaska History Professor, University of Alaska) The response vessels were either under snow or being repaired. They were completely overwhelmed. Coast Guard didn t quite know what to do. (News reporter) Equipment to fight the spill has to be flown in from as far away as Texas and England. (News reporter) Exxon says it s using all available resources but it argues the spill is simply too big to surround with booms and skim it up. (Narrator) As images of the spill appeared on the evening news, Exxon began limited tests of chemical dispersants to try to break up the oil. The dispersants were controversial and it was unclear if they would work or cause even more harm. (Steve Cowper) The chemicals that you use to cause the oil to sink is very dangerous to marine life and we have to be certain that we cause a minimal amount of damage. (Narrator) But it was soon too late to matter. (News reporter) Winds up to 70 miles an hour virtually shut down the oil spill clean-up operation this morning. (Stephen Haycox) The storm would come up, the oil was moving and almost nothing could be done. (News reporter) Some crews are literally on their knees using absorbent towels to remove the oil from rocky beaches. (Narrator ) Less than 15% of the oil was recovered. News cameras captured the damage. (News reporter) 800 miles of shoreline already covered with oil. (Narroator) And the anger. (Riki Ott) This should have been the easiest spill in the world to clean up. (News reporter) Growing questions about how future disasters of this kind can be prevented, and why there was such a slow response to this spill. (Narrator) At the same time, another storyline was taking hold. (Riki Ott) The Exxon spokesperson says There might have been a problem with Captain Hazelwood. Seems he had a bit of a drinking problem. (Peter Jenkins) Good evening. The captain was drinking. The captain has been fired. That is the sum of it from Alaska tonight. (Riki Ott) The story became Hazelwood. (Dave Letterman) Top Ten Excuses of the Exxon Tanker Captain. Number 10: Was trying to scrape ice off reef for margarita. (Stephen Haycox) That s a sensational kind of story. You have an immediate assignment of responsibility. An immediate villain. What was lost in all of that was the company s responsibility.

3 (Narrator) When a pipeline to bring oil from northern Alaska to Valdez was approved in 1973, the oil industry and the federal government promised to make safety a priority. (President Nixon) The Alaska pipeline s on it way. The environment will be saved. (Narrator) The government initially supported double-hulled tankers and a high tech navigation system in Valdez. (John Havelock, Alaska Attorney General, ) We were given blanket assurances about safety and spills. In retrospect, I erred in not making sure that what was said was not put in writing. (Narrator) Those promises never materialized and when the State of Alaska passed its own safety law, the oil industry sued saying the law infringed on federal authority. (Stephen Haycox) The court threw out the state s plan so double hulled tankers, much more freedom to determine where the navigation channel would be. (Narrator) When the pipeline first opened, tankers were closely monitored by the Coast Guard and stayed in the shipping lanes even when they were clogged with ice flows. (Stephen Haycox) Instead of diverting out of the channel, they were supposed to slow down. (Narrator) But by the time the Exxon Valdez left port, the Coast Guard routinely allowed ships to leave the channel to avoid the increasing amount of ice. (John Havelock) Slowing down wass not something they want to do because time is money. (Captain Hazelwood) Judging by our radar, I will probably divert from the TSS and end up in the inbound lane if there s no conflicting traffic, over. (Narrator) A few minutes after that message the Coast Guard wasn t monitoring the Valdez on its radar. (Captain John Konrad, Former Oil Rig Captain and Editor of GCaptain, Maritime Industry Blog) The Coast Guard is supposed to be the check in case the ship makes a mistake. And they weren t, they weren t watching the ship. (Narrator) Captain Hazelwood turned the bridge over to third mate, Gregory Cousins and went to his quarters after giving instructions to maneuver around the ice. (NTSB Investigator) Did you have any concerns about getting past the ice? (Gregory Cousins, Third Mate, Exxon Valdez) Not at that time. Not at that instant, no. (Captain Konrad) Cousins continued going south, heading directly into Bligh Reef. (Narrator) A federal investigation later found that Cousins lost track of the ship s location and didn t turn back in time. It found that reduced tanker crews probably left Cousins overworked and tired, contributing to the accident. A conclusion that Cousins and Exxon disputed. The investigation faulted Hazelwood for leaving the bridge and said his judgement was impaired by alcohol. Hazelwood denied he was drunk and was later acquitted of criminal charges related to drinking. (Captain Konrad) Did they have some fault? Yes. But the real fault was there wasn t the safety net.

4 (Narrator) Exxon spent more than $2 billion dollars cleaning up the spill and says there was no long-term environmental damage but pockets of oil remain beneath the surface of some beaches more than two decades later. (Riki Ott) Prince William Sound is not the same as it was. The environment still has not fully recovered and we re over two decades into this now. (Narrator) Exxon paid $300 million to those hurt by the spill and a jury later awarded another $5 billion in punitive damages. Exxon appealed delaying the case for 14 years and leaving lasting bitterness in Alaska. (New reporter) Four thousand of the original plaintiffs have died since the Exxon Valdez. (Narrator) In 2008, the Supreme Court cut punitive damages to 1/10 th of the original amount. (Mike Webber, Fisherman) The community is still very depressed. (Narrator) Fishermen like Mike Webber said the local economy never recovered. (Mike Webber) Five hundred people left. That s a lot in a small community. I ll never recover from the oil spill. (Narrator) After the spill, Exxon became an industry leader in safety. And millions of federal dollars were designated for cleanup research. Congress required better contingency planning, double hulled tankers and tug-boat escorts in Prince William Sound. (John Havelock) We were now making traffic out of Valdez probably the safest line of passage anywhere in the globe. (News reporter) The explosion happened at the Deep Water Horizon rig Tuesday night. (News reporter) Now everyone s hoping and praying that the Gulf of Mexico rig doesn t turn into an environmental disaster. (Tony Hayward, BP CEO) We re going to fight it sub-sea, on the surface and on the shore. (Narrator) After the BP oil spill, a presidential commission found that many lessons of the Exxon Valdez have been forgotten in the pursuit of off-shore oil drilling. (Bob Graham, US Senator and Co-Chairman, BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill Commission) I used the phrase the offense got way ahead of the defense. The potential risk had increased dramatically but there have been no commensurate increase in our capability to avoid an accident or to respond to it. (Narrator) It found that the major oil companies had made only a minimal investment in new response technology and the government spent less than half the authorized amount on clean up research. (Rex Tillerson ExxonMobil CEO) The emphasis is always on preventing these things from occurring because when they happen, we re not very well equipped to deal with them. (Narrator) The news was again, filled with the struggle to contain a massive spill. Using much of the same crude clean up technology used 20 years earlier.

5 (News reporter) We re still relying on booms, still relying on skimmers, still relying on shovels. (Narrator) And response plans that were again, unrealistic. (News reporter) Lawmakers are alarmed that BP s competitors have given the government nearly identical emergency response plans. Those plans include steps to protect wildlife that does not even live in the Gulf. (Narrator) And the government authorized BP to use nearly 2 million gallons of dispersants. Though many of the same questions were still unanswered. (News reporter) The key question that scientists are trying to figure out is whether oil dispersants in the deep ocean do more harm than good. (Narrator) The commission also found that while tanker safety improved after Valdez, the oil industry resisted new offshore drilling safety rules. (Bob Graham) It was reflective of a culture in the offshore oil industry. We ended up 20 years after Exxon Valdez with an even more serious incident but no better prepared to avoid it or deal with it. (Narrator) The other oil companies, including Exxon, have denied that a systemic problem exists. (Rex Tillerson) We would not have drilled the well the way they did. (Narrator) Three years after the spill, new commitments have once again been made to improve spill prevention and response. (Bob Graham) Three years out from Exxon Valdez there was still deep commitment to applying the lessons that had been learned. Ten years out, that commitment had substantially eroded. If you come back in the year 2020 and ask What have we learned? Are we safer? I think we ll know whether we really learned the lesson of Exxon Valdez.