The April 2000 spill of 140,000 gallons of a mixture of No. 6 and No. 2 fuel oils affected an estimated 76 acres of brackish marsh in the Patuxent River, with extensive areas of heavily oiled interior marsh habitat. Because of the predicted long-term persistence of oil-related impacts to wetland functions and services, RPI conducted a 7-year post-spill study, consisting of field and laboratory studies to assess the recovery status of the impacted wetlands – one of the few comprehensive studies of brackish marshes with extensive interior oiling. These results were comparable with the predicted recovery rates developed during the Natural Resource Damage Assessment.