Washington (CNN) -- As they furiously typed computer code through the night in a small Capitol Hill office, little did they know they were about to change the way Americans would view what has become known as the worst offshore oil spill in U.S. history. The handful of staffers from Rep. Ed Markey's now defunct Select Committee for Energy Independence and Global Warming had just received word from oil giant BP that they would be given a live feed of the underwater cameras monitoring the spewing oil from 8,000 feet below the Gulf of Mexico. The date was May 19, 2010, nearly one month to the day that the Deepwater Horizon well had exploded, killing 11 workers and causing oil to stream unabated into the Gulf.
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Spillcam changed the way BP, government responded to Gulf oil disaster
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Underwater camera allowed scientists to better understand the gusher
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Rep. Markey says a year later, Congress has taken no action to prevent another spill
Markey and other congressional Democrats had been pressuring @placeholder to allow them to see the live pictures.