Mississippi Gulf Coast Mississippi Gulf Coast The Mississippi Gulf Coast, also known as the Mississippi Gulf Coast region, or simply The Coast, is the area of southern Mississippi along the Mississippi Sound along the Gulf Of Mexico. The term has traditionally referred to the three counties that lie directly on the Mississippi Sound that meet up with the Gulf of Mexico within the state: Hancock County, Harrison County, and Jackson County. The U. S. Census Bureau divided the Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA) for the Mississippi Gulf Coast in 2003, which previously had been the three coastal counties, into two MSAs that included two
Offshore oil and gas in the Gulf of Mexico (United States) Gulf Coast Florida, has never been a petroleum-producing area. From the 1950s to the 1990s, oil companies drilled exploratory wells off the Gulf Coast of Florida. Nineteen wells were drilled in state waters, and forty were drilled in federal waters. Gulf Oil drilled the first offshore Florida oil exploration wells in 1947, in state waters in Florida Bay south of Cape Sable, Monroe County. In 1956 Humble Oil drilled an exploratory well in state waters of Pensacola Bay, Santa Rosa County. In 1959 Gulf Oil drilled the first offshore Florida well drilled from an offshore platform, off the Florida Keys.