NOAA: Most Spilled Oil Still in Gulf Waters

For weeks, wary Gulf Coast residents have been told that the bulk of the oil spilled into the Gulf of Mexico by the BP Deepwater Horizon disaster had simply disappeared. It turns out that may have been several million barrels of wishful thinking. According to testimony before the House Energy and Commerce panel Thursday, Bill Lehr, a senior scientist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said it's likely that at least 75 percent of the oil that spilled from the ruptured BP well is still in the Gulf .

Lehr told the panel that that just 10 percent of the estimated 4.1 million barrels of oil that leaked into the Gulf have thusfar been either skimmed or burned, according to a report in The Hill.

The AP, meanwhile, is reporting that a major complicating factor in assessing the Gulf cleanup remains a 22-mile-long invisible mist of oil lurking in the 40-degree waters far below the surface. The mist will likely linger for many months and remain a threat to marine life despite the fact that it cannot be easily seen or detected, scientists at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts say.