Marine life within the Verde Island Passage. Photo credit: California Academy of Sciences
An oil spill is a catastrophic event where large quantities of petroleum or crude oil are unintentionally released into the environment, resulting in widespread contamination of water, soil, and air, with severe ecological, economic, and social impacts that can persist for years or even decades¹. This was the exact disaster that occurred when MT Princess Empress, an oil tanker carrying 800,000 liters of industrial fuel, sank off Naujan, Oriental Mindoro² last February 28³.
Naujan is located along the Verde Island Passage (VIP)⁴, regarded as the probable epicenter of marine biodiversity in the Indo-Malay-Philippines Archipelago (IMPA)⁵ […].
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