The worst oil spill in the history of the petroleum industry started on Apr. 20, after an explosion at the BP-run Deepwater Horizon offshore drilling rig in the Gulf of Mexico killed 11 workers aboard and gushed close to 5 million barrels of crude into the Gulf's waters until it was sufficiently capped on July 15 (the undersea well was deemed "effectively dead" only on Sept. 19). The extent of the damage after a summer of "oil plumes" and ineffectual "top kills" is still being measured, its costs still counted. More than 6,000 birds, some 600 sea turtles and 100 dolphins perished. The fisheries of the region have been devastated, as was the Gulf coast's tourism industry. The Obama Administration took a lot of flak for not stemming the gushing oil faster, and found itself largely beholden to the technical savvy of BP's engineers. BP was public enemy no. 1 for the summer, and took an estimated $40 billion hit for plunging the U.S. in this cruddy mess. But it still managed to turn a profit in the third quarter of 2010.
The Top 10 Everything of 2010
- Top 10 Albums
- Top 10 Animal Stories
- Top 10 Apologies
- Top 10 Biz Deals
- Top 10 Buzzwords
- Top 10 Campaign Ads
- Top 10 Comebacks
- Top 10 Crime Stories
- Top 10 Facebook Trends
- Top 10 Fashion Statements
- Top 10 Feuds
- Top 10 Fiction Books
- Top 10 Fleeting Celebrities
- Top 10 Food Trends
- Top 10 Gadgets
- Top 10 Green Stories
- Top 10 iPhone Apps
- Top 10 Late-Night Jokes
- Top 10 Magazine Covers
- Top 10 Medical Breakthroughs
- Top 10 Movie Performances
- Top 10 Movies
- Top 10 New Species
- Top 10 Nonfiction Books
- Top 10 Numbers
- Top 10 Oddball News Stories
- Top 10 Overreported Stories
- Top 10 Pictures
- Top 10 Plays and Musicals
- Top 10 Quotes
- Top 10 Political Gaffes
- Top 10 Reality-TV Moments
- Top 10 Religion Stories
- Top 10 Scandals
- Top 10 Scientific Discoveries
- Top 10 Songs
- Top 10 Sports Moments
- Top 10 Talented Web Videos
- Top 10 Toys
- Top 10 Travel Moments
- Top 10 TV Commercials
- Top 10 TV Episodes
- Top 10 TV Series
- Top 10 Tweets
- Top 10 Twitter Moments
- Top 10 World News Stories
- Top 10 Underreported Stories
- Top 10 U.S. News Stories
- Top 10 Video Games
- Top 10 Viral Videos
In 50 wide-ranging lists, TIME surveys the highs and lows, the good and the bad, of the past 12 months