Degrees of disaster

by Jeff Wheelwright

Using the twice-damaged Prince William Sound in Alaska as his stage, nature and science writer Jeff Wheelwright describes what happens to the environment after a catastrophic assaulthow scientists try to measure the changes and how it is that nature reels and adapts. What happens to wilderness ecosystems when they are struck by environmental disaster? Prince William Sound has experienced two events in the past quarter-century, the 9.2 earthquake of 1964 and the Exxon Valdez oil spill of 1989. Both the natural and manmade disaster are extreme examples of disturbances, and Wheelwright, in this rich ecological history of the Sound, provides many lesser examples. He shows that a healthy natural system is constantly in flux. Animal populations rise and fall; variability and patchiness are the rule. The factors that cause biological change are numerous and overlapping and often can't be sorted out in spite of the best efforts of scientists. But an ecosystem such as Prince William Sound readi