Afloat in the Ocean, Expanding Islands of Trash

[Guest guest]

Some stunning relevant pictures:

http://www.bestlifeonline.com/cms/uploads/1/sea-turtle-deformed_1.jpg

 

http://apps.pathology.jhu.edu/blogs/pathology/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/garbadg\

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e.jpg

 

http://dejaloops.files.wordpress.com/2009/08/plastic-beach-03.jpg

 

http://myecoaction.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/great-pacific-garbage-patch.jp\

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g

 

 

The article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/10/science/10patch.html?_r=2

 

Afloat in the Ocean, Expanding Islands of Trash

By LINDSEY HOSHAW

Published: November 9, 2009

ABOARD THE ALGUITA, 1,000 miles northeast of Hawaii — In this remote patch of

the Pacific Ocean, hundreds of miles from any national boundary, the detritus of

human life is collecting in a swirling current so large that it defies precise

measurement.

 

Light bulbs, bottle caps, toothbrushes, Popsicle sticks and tiny pieces of

plastic, each the size of a grain of rice, inhabit the Pacific garbage patch, an

area of widely dispersed trash that doubles in size every decade and is now

believed to be roughly twice the size of Texas. But one research organization

estimates that the garbage now actually pervades the Pacific, though most of it

is caught in what oceanographers call a gyre like this one — an area of heavy

currents and slack winds that keep the trash swirling in a giant whirlpool.

 

Scientists say the garbage patch is just one of five that may be caught in giant

gyres scattered around the world's oceans. Abandoned fishing gear like buoys,

fishing line and nets account for some of the waste, but other items come from

land after washing into storm drains and out to sea.

 

Plastic is the most common refuse in the patch because it is lightweight,

durable and an omnipresent, disposable product in both advanced and developing

societies. It can float along for hundreds of miles before being caught in a

gyre and then, over time, breaking down.

 

But once it does split into pieces, the fragments look like confetti in the

water. Millions, billions, trillions and more of these particles are floating in

the world's trash-filled gyres.

 

PCBs, DDT and other toxic chemicals cannot dissolve in water, but the plastic

absorbs them like a sponge. Fish that feed on plankton ingest the tiny plastic

particles. Scientists from the Algalita Marine Research Foundation say that fish

tissues contain some of the same chemicals as the plastic. The scientists

speculate that toxic chemicals are leaching into fish tissue from the plastic

they eat.

 

The researchers say that when a predator — a larger fish or a person — eats the

fish that eats the plastic, that predator may be transferring toxins to its own

tissues, and in greater concentrations since toxins from multiple food sources

can accumulate in the body.

 

Charles Moore found the Pacific garbage patch by accident 12 years ago, when he

came upon it on his way back from a sailing race in Hawaii. As captain, Mr.

Moore ferried three researchers, his first mate and a journalist here this

summer in his 10th scientific trip to the site. He is convinced that several

similar garbage patches remain to be discovered.

 

" Anywhere you really look for it, you're going to see it, " he said.

 

Many scientists believe there is a garbage patch off the coast of Japan and

another in the Sargasso Sea, in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean.

 

Bonnie Monteleone, a University of North Carolina, Wilmington, graduate student

researching a master's thesis on plastic accumulation in the ocean, visited the

Sargasso Sea in late spring and the Pacific garbage patch with Mr. Moore this

summer.

 

" I saw much higher concentrations of trash in the Pacific garbage patch than in

the Sargasso, " Ms. Monteleone said, while acknowledging that she might not have

found the Atlantic gyre.

 

Ms. Monteleone, a volunteer crew member on Mr. Moore's ship, kept hoping she

would see at least one sample taken from the Pacific garbage patch without any

trash in it. " Just one area — just one, " she said. " That's all I wanted to see.

But everywhere had plastic. "

 

The Pacific garbage patch gained prominence after three independent marine

research organizations visited it this summer. One of them, Project Kaisei,

based in San Francisco, is trying to devise ways to clean up the patch by

turning plastic into diesel fuel.

 

Environmentalists and celebrities are using the patch to promote their own

causes. The actor Ted Danson's nonprofit group Oceana designated Mr. Moore a

hero for his work on the patch. Another Hollywood figure, Edward Norton,

narrated a public-service announcement about plastic bags, which make their way

out to the patch.

 

Mr. Moore, however, is the first person to have pursued serious scientific

research by sampling the garbage patch. In 1999, he dedicated the Algalita

foundation to studying it. Now the foundation examines plastic debris and takes

samples of polluted water off the California coast and across the Pacific Ocean.

By dragging a fine mesh net behind his research vessel Alguita, a 50-foot

aluminum catamaran, Mr. Moore is able to collect small plastic fragments.

 

Researchers measure the amount of plastic in each sample and calculate the

weight of each fragment. They also test the tissues of any fish caught in the

nets to measure for toxic chemicals. One rainbow runner from a previous voyage

had 84 pieces of plastic in its stomach.

 

The research team has not tested the most recent catch for toxic chemicals, but

the water samples show that the amount of plastic in the gyre and the larger

Pacific is increasing. Water samples from February contained twice as much

plastic as samples from a decade ago.

 

" This is not the garbage patch I knew in 1999, " Mr. Moore said. " This is a

totally different animal. "

 

For the captain's first mate, Jeffery Ernst, the patch was " just a reminder that

there's nowhere that isn't affected by humanity. "

 

Travel expenses were paid in part by readers of Spot.Us, a nonprofit Web project

that supports freelance journalists.