Rubbish dump found floating in Pacific Ocean is twice the size of America

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Rubbish dump found floating in Pacific Ocean is twice the size of America

Last updated at 00:20 06 February 2008

 

Comments (22) Add to My Stories A rubbish dump twice the size of the United

States has been discovered floating in the Pacific Ocean.

The vast expanse of debris, made up of plastic junk including footballs, kayaks,

Lego blocks and carrier bags, is kept together by swirling underwater currents.

 

It stretches from 500 nautical miles off the Californian coast, across the

northern Pacific, past Hawaii and almost as far as Japan.

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'Plastic soup': The vast expanse of rubbish is kept together by swirling

currents. It stretches from 500 nautical miles off the Californian coast, across

the Pacific, past Hawaii and almost as far as Japan

 

Because the rubbish, which has been called a ?plastic soup? and a ?trash

vortex?, is translucent and lies just below the water's surface it cannot be

seen in satellite photographs.

American oceanographer Charles Moore discovered the Great Pacific Garbage Patch

by chance in 1997 while taking a short cut home from a yacht race.

 

He said: Every time I came on deck there was trash floating by. How could we

have fouled such a huge area? How could this go on for a week?

 

He warned that the rubbish could double in size over the next decade if

consumers do not cut back on their use of plastics. More than a million seabirds

and 100,000 marine mammals die every year as a result of plastic rubbish.

 

Syringes, cigarette lighters and toothbrushes have all been found inside the

stomachs of dead seabirds.

 

The rubbish can also be dangerous for humans, because tiny plastic pellets in

the sea can attract man-made chemicals which then enter the food chain.

 

Research director Dr Marcus Eriksen said: ?What goes into the ocean goes into

these animals and onto your dinner plate. It's that simple.?

Oceanographer Curtis Ebbesmeyer compared the rubbish to a living entity. He

said: ?It moves around like a big animal without a leash.? Describing what

happens when it reaches land, he said: ?The garbage patch barfs, and you get a

beach covered with this confetti of plastic.?

 

The rubbish dump is made up of two linked areas either side of Hawaii. Around

one-fifth of the junk is thrown off ships or oil platforms, while the rest comes

from the land.

 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-512424/Rubbish-dump-floating-Pacific-Oce\

an-twice-size-America.html

 

 

Here's what readers have had to say so far. Why not add your thoughts below?

 

It would be very easy for ships fitted with large surface netting equipment to

scoop up this garbage and bring it to shore for disposal. Why isn't it

happening? Because, as always, no one wants to be the one paying for it.

 

Max Hess, Folkestone UK, 05/2/2008 15:58

 

 

I worked on the cruise liners in the 80s and we threw all the ships rubbish in

to the sea at night via a chute inside the ship. 1000s of black sacks over the

months I worked there. No one thought about the problems it would cause in those

days.

 

Brian, Grays, 05/2/2008 15:49

 

 

This is a disgrace and goes on to fortify my belief that the human race is just

a form of lice on planet Earth!

 

- Diana, UK, 05/2/2008 15:47