Vanessa Bolano ABC26 News

June 17, 2010
PASCAGOULA, MS—
Would you rely on your nose to tell you what's safe for dinner? NOAA says finely tuned noses are in demand right now. ABC26 News Reporter Vanessa Bolano is sniffing out the details.

We all like the smell of a home cooked meal, but since the oil spill, how do you know what you're eating is safe? Leave it up to screeners.

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"I never thought I'd be here, at this point, learning to detect the taint in the seafood," says student Julie Anderson.

Anderson has just one of the finely tuned noses trained to "Sniff out" traces of oil in raw seafood before it makes it to on your dinner plate.

Student Jon Bell says, "Even though it seems obvious, 'Oh it smells like oil,' we're dealing with products that may have very, very low thresh holds to be able to identify so that we can maintain the safety of the seafood for the nation."

NOAA and the International Food Protection Training Institute offer the classes they call "Efficient" in Pascagoula.

Gerald Wojtala, Executive Director of IFPTI, says "If there is something detected at a very low level we can stop it there."

Everyone in Thursday's session will be working in Louisiana. Students say it's not as easy as it looks because the smells can give you a headache.

To cleanse senses students smell fresh foods like watermelon, cucumber, or corn. They say those foods recalibrates the nose.

Sensory detection is no new phenomenon. What's different now is the smell. Screeners are given vials of crude from the source to remind their nose what it's looking for.

The training sessions started two weeks ago. So far, 60 noses have graduated. Classes focusing on oil detection in the Gulf are expected to continue for more than a year.