North Atlantic bluefin tuna
Critically endangered and overfished, North Atlantic bluefin tuna numbers have plummeted by 90 percent since the 1970s. Now the oil spill has the potential to erase the entire U.S. population because most of the fish use the Gulf of Mexico as their spawning ground.
Even worse, they typically arrive in the Gulf to spawn between April and July, coinciding perfectly with the oil spill. Adult tuna are additionally threatened by the large underwater oil plumes which occupy the same ocean layers where the fish typically travel.