Wildlife Observations from the 2015 Refugio Beach Oil Spill

NOAA and partner agencies documented wildlife observations in the Refugio Beach Oil Spill area on May 21, 2015. The spill occurred on May 19, 2015, when a pipeline rupture released an estimated 21,000 gallons of oil into the Pacific Ocean near Santa Barbara County, California. This data layer was created to support the investigation of environmental impacts and restoration planning.

Use Cases

• Assessing immediate wildlife impacts based on observations recorded after the spill.
• Supporting environmental restoration planning based on documented wildlife presence.
• Analyzing spatial distribution of affected species based on the geospatial nature of the data.
• Contributing to baseline studies for hazard mitigation and oil spill response protocols.

Strengths

• Data is tied to a specific, documented environmental event with a known date and location.
• Produced by NOAA, a federal agency with expertise in environmental science and response.
• Focuses on a critical post-spill observation period (May 21, 2015).

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
• Data is from a single observation time point; temporal scope is limited.

Provenance

Source

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Department of Commerce

Collection Method

Observations likely gathered by state and federal partner agencies during spill response.

Time Range

May 21, 2015

Freshness

Last updated 2026-03-13 22:25:25.345080; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Refugio State Beach area, Santa Barbara County, California, USA