What's the forecast for oil in Key West in late June?

June 3, 2010 8:18 AM

Going to Naples and Key West for vacation in late June -- would you be worried about oil spill? Any other tips for the trip?

Will be heading down to Naples to see family during last weekend in June. After that, planning on taking a few days to stay in Key West. (This looks like a great way to get from the Ft. Myers area to Key West by the way.)

Ideal trip would be to stay in an easy-going bed and breakfast in Key West, bike riding around the island(s), drinking in the afternoon and some beginner-type SCUBA diving (not necessarily in that order).

Of course the major concern is whether we'll be fighting off tar balls in the Keys by late-June. This article says that if undersea oil hits the loop current, it will likely end up in the Keys. If that happens we can adjust our plans for the second half of the trip, and find a place on the Atlantic Coast of Florida...

All that's been booked so far is a one-way Jetblue flight from JFK-Ft. Myers, and a one-way Delta flight back to New York from Miami. No hotels booked yet, so we're somewhat flexible on the second half of the trip (just would need to be close to Miami for the evening flight back to NYC).

Question is:
1) What's the consensus on how likely it is that our planned trip to Key West will be disrupted by the oil spill (planned for last weekend in June).
2) If Key West trip would be sub-optimal, what are other options in areas close to Miami less likely to be affected by the spill?

posted by BobbyVan to Travel & Transportation around Key West, FL (5 answers total)

I'm not sure if anyone really knows for sure - the published forecasts don't seem to go out much more than 72 hours at a time.. I've been following the situation reports at the Florida Department of Environmental Protection's website, which also has links to beach closure information....at the moment, everything's open though I'd expect problems in the Pensacola area before too much longer.
posted by jquinby at 9:38 AM on June 3, 2010

...and news out of Key West isn't that good, apparently - the oil is closing in on the Dry Tortugas and BP has opened a claim office in Marathon Key.
posted by jquinby at 9:41 AM on June 3, 2010

There are just lots of variables out there that might affect how the oil moves. The best trajectory maps I've seen are from NOAA (down at the bottom of the page) and those only project out 72 hours. The beach status page for the spill response is a good starting point for current conditions and links from that may have projections. Things are really just approaching NW FL right now and the Keys are fairly far away, but conditions can rapidly change. I've heard of numerous modeling projections that tend to say that the majority of the mass of the oil will be heading west toward Texas, but I wouldn't put much stock in those because even a smaller amount of oil could ruin your trip. Of course, the further out of the Gulf you might be and the further up the Atlantic coast you might be would result in lower probability that your trip could be influenced by oil. Not sure that this really helps you three weeks out from your trip, but a hurricane could also crop up between now and then too. My guess (and it's purely that) would be that you won't have issues in the Keys at the end of the month.
posted by pappy at 9:55 AM on June 3, 2010

You could always skip key west and go to the hollywood ft lauderdale area which is on the atlantic coast and also not that far away from miami. A lot of things to do in the area . Miami is a short drive away if your renting a car.
posted by majortom1981 at 11:04 AM on June 3, 2010

Well, here's a better guess at how the oil might migrate (though big caution on real world applicability when they are saying that they didn't take density and degradation into account). The animations they've got of their projections are pretty cool.
posted by pappy at 11:13 AM on June 3, 2010