**2. The 1987 Eastern Gulf of Mexico Red Tide Event**

On August 24, 1987, a breakout of the Red Tide was reported off the coast of Naples, Florida, in the GOM. As the oceanic currents flow, Naples is *On the Possibility of Non-Local and Local Oil Spills Striking the Shores of North Carolina... DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.106679*

approximately 1600 kilometers (1010 miles), from the coasts of the Carolinas. If the Red Tide plants were able to jump aboard the Loop Current in the Gulf of Mexico, they could have been transported down the west Florida coast, around the Florida Keys, through the Florida Straits where it would have become part of the westward flowing Antilles Current and then loaded into the northward flowing Florida Current, which then becomes the northward flowing Gulf Stream (**Figure 1**). From the east coast of Florida, the organism would have had to have traveled north reaching Onslow Bay NC and Long Bay NC/SC outer shelf waters sometime in early October. Let us first consider the conditions that were present at the time.

In **Figure 2a**, the NOAA National Weather Service (NWS) atmospheric pressure map for August 24, 1987 shows a high-pressure center located in the southeastern USA. The winds associated with this weather system on the west Florida shelf would have been to the south, thereby effecting an offshore transport of surface waters via an Ekman surface layer [3] from the shelf into the eastern side of the GOM Loop Current. Two weeks hence, we find a low-pressure center or atmospheric cyclone located in the southeast, as shown in the September 7 weather map in **Figure 2b**. The winds are to the north on the eastern Atlantic Florida shelf, thereby driving surface coastal waters offshore, again via Ekman surface layer dynamics [3, 4], into the Gulf Stream. Therefore, while the Red Tide organisms were likely in the area of the east Florida shelf, winds were unfavorable for onshore transport out of the western edge of the Gulf Stream and onto the shelf. Therefore, the organisms stayed in the Gulf Stream, on its western side, marching northward. They could have gone from the western side of the Gulf Stream via the Astronomical Tides or due to Gulf Stream–related phenomena. We investigate that further below in Sections 3, 4, and 5.

**Figure 1.** *The Loop, Antilles and Florida Currents, and the Gulf Stream (from [2]).*

**Figure 2.**

*NWS 500 mb surface pressure maps. (a) Left image is August 24, 1987; (b) right image is September 8 1987. These maps are hard copies of those produced by the NWS and are copied with full fidelity.*
