click the photo to see more plastic in the sea
A ”plastic soup” of waste floating in the Pacific Ocean is growing at an alarming rate and now covers an area twice the size of the continental United States, scientists have said.
The vast expanse of debris – in effect the world’s largest rubbish dump – is held in place by swirling underwater currents. This drifting “soup” stretches from about 500 nautical miles off the Californian coast, across the northern Pacific, past Hawaii and almost as far as Japan. The Independant tells it as it is
Is how the Independant newspaper describes it.
Though Greenpeace have been worried for a while
Many seabirds and their chicks have been found dead, their stomachs filled with medium sized plastic items such as bottle tops, lighters and balloons.
However others are picking up the story try schnews for the nasty nurdles
billions of tiny plastic pellets, called nurdles – the raw materials for the plastic industry – are lost or spilled every year, many ending up in the sea. These act like chemical sponges, soaking up other toxic man-made chemicals, all artificial pollutants (for toxicity think DDT pesticide etc), concentrating them up to a million times more than in normal sea water.
But lets give Dr Erikson as quoted in the Independant the last word
They then enter the food chain. “What goes into the ocean goes into these animals and onto your dinner plate. It’s that simple,” said Dr Eriksen.
Why are there no photos?
Oysters garter has the best answer
other articles to read on the subject are
Naked man in the tree
the great photo is by plasticbagpics check out the rest
Save the birds by going plastic free. Find plastic free products with the >>>A-Z<<< plastic free index
April 18, 2008 at 10:44 am
I’ve read several reports about this and found it both incredible and disturbing.
Well done on bringing it to our attention, and thanks for the other links. xx
April 21, 2008 at 10:29 pm
I know – how can it really be happening and seemingly only a few people seem to think its a problem? wierd