Telling Their Stories About 'The Monster Under The Water'
BP's oil spill never physically hit Delacroix Island, La., but the disaster has devastated the community and its fishing industry indelibly.
Pultizer Prize winning photojournalist Melanie Burford captures the impact through "The Monster Under The Water," a short documentary produced for ProPublica.
Within the 11-minute-long film, Burford lets the resident islanders tell a story about the comprehensive destruction of their way of life. Eric Melerine, a crab fisherman, contributed his thoughts to the film, reflecting on the insidious nature of BP's spill.
"We been through hurricanes, but we never been through something like this before. It's human nature to be afraid of what you don't know. Hurricanes are easy. You just come back and buy everything all over again. The oil -- it could destroy this from the inside out."
From compensation payments that caused fishermen to unravel their own industry, to the unquantifiable emotional toll of the disaster, Burford captures what went wrong.
WATCH:
