The Gulf of Mexico Expedition Team

The Cousteau team has been on expeditions almost continuously for the past sixty years. Team members have come and gone and many have come back continuously for the next adventure. This list represents those team members who have been a part of the past, the present and may well be a part of future expeditions.

As the OFS team continues to explore communities on the Gulf, they are finding that, in these early stages, little is known about the ultimate consequences of the oil spill, so fear is playing a role that may be unnecessarily harmful.

Jean-Michel Cousteau interviews Billy Nungesser, President of the Plaquemines Parish in Louisiana, where oil is now entering nearby marshes. Matt Ferraro of the Ocean Futures Expedition Team explores the now oily marsh and finds plants and animals coated in oil.

Dive under water with the Ocean Futures Team as they become the first to dive in and document the oil covered waters off the coast of Louisiana.

PBS News Hour's "The Rundown" caught up with Jean-Michel Cousteau to chat about what his team discovered on dives last week into the Gulf of Mexico oil leak.

Jean-Michel discussed the controversial use of dispersants to break up the oil:

"To add another chemical to the ocean, I think has some long-term consequence which we are not even aware of what it's going to do. Personally, I think it was a mistake. We are much better equipped to capture oil at the surface provided that the weather allows that to happen."

ean-Michel Cousteau recently checked in with PBS News Hour's "The Rundown" to update them on his team's explorations since returning to the Gulf Coast.

Since his last visit, Cousteau has been both on the water with local fishermen and in the air surveying the site of the BP oil spill via helicopter. The team is concerned with the growing impact the oil is having on animals throughout the Gulf's ecosystem as the damage from the oil makes its way up the food chain.

Some are questioning whether the dispersants being used to break apart the oil that has leaked into the Gulf are harmful to wildlife and plants. Spencer Michels reports from Buras, Louisana.

Jean-Michel Cousteau reports from Buras, Louisiana about the threat of tropical storm Bonnie. As the Ocean Futures Society team is in the field covering the BP oil spill Jean-Michel provides his thoughts on the latest developments.

The morning of July 27, officials in Jefferson Parish reported a new oil spill near Bayou Saint Denis, Louisiana.

The Coast Guard claimed that a tow boat struck a well head, causing the spill, and a strip of oil 50 yards wide and a mile long was spotted near the well early in the day.

The Ocean Futures Society team was onsite within hours and reported a geyser of oil and gas spewing 100 feet into the air and raining down on the marsh.

At the request of Louisiana's Plaquemines Parish, the Ocean Futures Society team spent the weekend diving in the Gulf of Mexico, searching for remnants of the oil spill. OFS Director of Photography Matt Ferraro talked with the AP about what they found.