Pacific Trash Vortex! Wow! I had no idea it was this bad!

[bmrwizard99]

Wow...Scary!

Tks Shaka Doug for the info. I'll have to pass this on to a few people to see what exposure we can bring to it.

Gord

 

[sea nmf]

Clean up options wont even begin until the rest of the world yells "Clean it up!"...so lets get the rest of the world involved...sounds like a concrete idea to me.

Just a thought, especially in light of what Lopaka said. Perhaps you can sort of get a feel for what region in the world this trash is primarily coming from? Maybe film words on the plastic, if there are any?

We are all part of the problem, I know. But if it is shown that most of the trash is from a certain region, isn't that where a good part of the education should be targeted? Maybe fund raising could be done to educate the primary offenders.

 

[ScubaSteve]

As I recall somebody balked at the idea of dropping a net and picking up all the garbage because the problem is so much bigger than that net........Lao-Tzu said it best "A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step".

Without correcting the root cause, the problem will continue to get worse but through education, if we can get the "culprits" to stop, then perhaps we would be on the road to recovery one full net at a time. The reality is to do nothing but educate, does not make the problem get better. It simply stunts the growth.

 

[sea nmf]

Yes, but wouldn't targeted education be more effective?

Since Drew is filming, I would guess that maybe he could film the writing on the plastic, when there is some writing. The long shots are dramatic; but close ups would be helpful.

 

[scubadrewvideo]

Update:
I will be on legs 1 and 2 for close to 2 months. Departing LA June 10th.
I will be taping everything! So yes we will look for identifying markers. That has been going on already and I can tell you from 7 yrs ago, the majority of pieces found with disdinguishable markings came from Asia, Russia and USA.
I am in comunication with Good Morning America to set up a way to bring the story to homes around the world as the voyage is underway.
Mahalo again for all your support.
For those of you with Facebook, you can see the new "2009 gyre voyage cause" for updated information regarding the voyage. Just go thru my profile linked below.
Drew

 

[Anthony Appleyard]

And pray that mocroorganiusms evolve that can break it down.

 

[ScubaSteve]

I will personally hope that microorganisms will evolve and be able to break it down.

 

[AbyssalPlains]

Thanks for alerting the SB community to this problem. I heard about this a while back through an excellent article Our Oceans Are Turning Into Plastic...Are We? by Susan Casey (the author of "The Devil's Teeth", a fantastic book about Great White Shark research on the Farallon Islands), and then another one in the LA Times (RIP): Plague of Plastic Chokes the Seas - Los Angeles Times

I was always under the impression the issue had been reported on extensively. But being a science journalist myself and reading through this thread, I'm starting to think this might not be the case and I should start thinking doing my small part in helping raise more awareness.

In the meantime, I have started to contribute my own tiny share to reducing the plastic problem, for example by shunning plastic bags and bringing reusable totes for my grocery shopping.

I think this thread should be in the more general section of SB also. Does anyone how to go about getting a moderator to perhaps mirror the thread in the Environment/Marine Science section?

 

[Lopaka]

Yes, but wouldn't targeted education be more effective?

Call me a cynic, but if this stuff is mostly Asian in origin, you would be trying to persuade societies that think killing whales and wiping out endangered species for sex cures is just fine. They don't seem to listen to anyone else..................

 

[ScubaSteve]

You cynic

Call me a cynic

But I do agree. If nature and the environment were a concern perhaps Shark Fin soup sales would drop off with a ton of other questionable practices.

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