Rfalconcam Forum

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) - Researchers are warning of a new blight at sea: a swirl of confetti-like plastic debris stretching over a remote expanse of the Atlantic Ocean.

The floating garbage - hard to spot from the surface and spun together by a vortex of currents - was documented by two groups of scientists who trawled the sea between scenic Bermuda and Portugal's mid-Atlantic Azores islands.

The studies describe a soup of micro-particles similar to the so-called Great Pacific Garbage Patch, a phenomenon discovered a decade ago between Hawaii and California that researchers say is likely to exist in other places around the globe.

"We found the great Atlantic garbage patch," said Anna Cummins, who collected plastic samples on a sailing voyage in February.

The debris is harmful for fish, sea mammals - and at the top of the food chain, potentially humans - even though much of the plastic has broken into such tiny pieces they are nearly invisible.

Since there is no realistic way of cleaning the oceans, advocates say the key is to keep more plastic out by raising awareness and, wherever possible, challenging a throwaway culture that uses non-biodegradable materials for disposable products.

"Our job now is to let people know that plastic ocean pollution is a global problem - it unfortunately is not confined to a single patch," Cummins said.

The research teams presented their findings in February at the 2010 Oceans Sciences Meeting in Portland, Oregon. While scientists have reported finding plastic in parts of the Atlantic since the 1970s, the researchers say they have taken important steps toward mapping the extent of the pollution.

Cummins and her husband, Marcus Eriksen, of Santa Monica, California, sailed across the Atlantic for their research project. They plan similar studies in the South Atlantic in November and the South Pacific next spring.

On the voyage from Bermuda to the Azores, they crossed the Sargasso Sea, an area bounded by ocean currents including the Gulf Stream. They took samples every 100 miles (160 kilometers) with one interruption caused by a major storm. Each time they pulled up the trawl, it was full of plastic.

A separate study by undergraduates with the Woods Hole, Massachusetts-based Sea Education Association collected more than 6,000 samples on trips between Canada and the Caribbean over two decades. The lead investigator, Kara Lavendar Law, said they found the highest concentrations of plastics between 22 and 38 degrees north latitude, an offshore patch equivalent to the area between roughly Cuba and Washington, D.C.

Long trails of seaweed, mixed with bottles, crates and other flotsam, drift in the still waters of the area, known as the North Atlantic Subtropical Convergence Zone. Cummins' team even netted a Trigger fish trapped alive inside a plastic bucket.

But the most nettlesome trash is nearly invisible: countless specks of plastic, often smaller than pencil erasers, suspended near the surface of the deep blue Atlantic.

"It's shocking to see it firsthand," Cummins said. "Nothing compares to being out there. We've managed to leave our footprint really everywhere."

Still more data are needed to assess the dimensions of the North Atlantic patch.

Charles Moore, an ocean researcher credited with discovering the Pacific garbage patch in 1997, said the Atlantic undoubtedly has comparable amounts of plastic. The east coast of the United States has more people and more rivers to funnel garbage into the sea. But since the Atlantic is stormier, debris there likely is more diffuse, he said.

Whatever the difference between the two regions, plastics are devastating the environment across the world, said Moore, whose Algalita Marine Research Foundation based in Long Beach, California, was among the sponsors for Cummins and Eriksen.

"Humanity's plastic footprint is probably more dangerous than its carbon footprint," he said.

Plastics have entangled birds and turned up in the bellies of fish: A paper cited by the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says as many as 100,000 marine mammals could die trash-related deaths each year.

The plastic bits, which can be impossible for fish to distinguish from plankton, are dangerous in part because they sponge up potentially harmful chemicals that are also circulating in the ocean, said Jacqueline Savitz, a marine scientist at Oceana, an ocean conservation group based in Washington.

As much as 80 percent of marine debris comes from land, according to the United Nations Environmental Program.

The U.S. government is concerned the pollution could hurt its vital interests.

"That plastic has the potential to impact our resources and impact our economy," said Lisa DiPinto, acting director of NOAA's marine debris program. "It's great to raise awareness so the public can see the plastics we use can eventually land in the ocean."

DiPinto said the federal agency is co-sponsoring a new voyage this summer by the Sea Education Association to measure plastic pollution southeast of Bermuda. NOAA is also involved in research on the Pacific patch.

"Unfortunately, the kinds of things we use plastic for are the kinds of things we don't dispose of carefully," Savitz said. "We've got to use less of it, and if we're going to use it, we have to make sure we dispose of it well."

How disgusting humans can be! Hey folks take care of your trash properly!!!!!

That's sad and it's pretty bad on land too.  The plastic bags are all over the ground, hanging on trees, shrubs, lining all the roadways.  We were on the 490 going to Rochester the other day and we couldn't believe all the garbage that we saw that people are throwing out of their vehicles.  Another issue I have are the unsightly deer carcasses that aren't picked up by highway teams anymore because of state money issues.  They're just rotting alongside the road. All really sad.  :(

At least the  deer get eaten by other animals and will decompose.

Louisville started an interesting pilot program some months ago whereby if you see someone toss trash out of their car window, you can go to a city web site, if you remember the license plate, and pay attention to the car make/model, and color, and report them.  Then the city sends out a "warning" to the offender, and reminds them that littering is punishable with a hefty fine.  I think the system is automated, so costs the city very little money.  I don't think there's much actual enforcement of the litter ordinances, but I don't know.  At least it may be raising awareness, but that's not a bad thing.  At a minimum, it gives me a way to channel my frustration if I see someone toss something out of their car!

I have a much more aggressive and crazy friend who goes everywhere on his bicycle, and when he is stopped at a light and sees someone drop trash out of the car, he maneuvers his bike to them, picks up the trash and politely says something like "I think you dropped this."

I read a book by a man who became fascinated with the oceans, and used the loss at sea of a cargo container of plastic tub toys - ducks, turtles, etc., and several cargo containers of Nike sneakers, to document the current cycle and timing of the Pacific Ocean.  It was Flotsametrics and the Floating World (http://flotsametrics.com/), by Curtis Ebbesmeyer and Eric Scigliano.

It includes stories of Christopher Columbus following flotsam to harbor, and other historical events that can be tied to flotsam.  It also includes details of the unfortunate existance of marine garbage patches around the world.

Excellent and fascinating read, to get a better idea of how some of the largest water systems on our planet work. At times depressing, to discover what humans are capable of doing to the planet, especially if they don't pay attention to what happens to the objects they use after they are done with them.

Kudos to your city and friend, Patti!  We'll probably never see that here in NY.  For many years we had "No Littering" signs on roads and highways that stated any littering was subject to fines but those are all gone now.  I wrote and called several government officials about a year ago telling them that the littering problem was really bad and something needed to be done but it fell on deaf ears.  Recently, I saw a guy that worked at Walmart in Henrietta who was gathering all the shopping carts to push back into the store.  I watched as he painstakingly took all the papers out of all the carts and I thought-this is great-he's going to throw them into the trash before they fly away.  Surprise!  He took the handful that he had, threw them all on the ground letting the wind blow them away and he looked so proud that he was bringing back clean carts! Really sad. People just don't think or don't care.

I saw Charles Moore on a talk show recently. Here are two Youtube videos featuring Charles. In the first, he's making a presentation at a TED conference (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FrAShtolieg) and the second video is a Nightline spot (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8a4S23uXIcM) on him with the same subject.

It's disheartening to see the pictures of the bottle caps and other plastic items that they found in the stomach of Albatross and other animals (in the first video). The picture of the turtle that "grew around" the bottle cap retainer ring is just sad. We've really got to clean up our act and this doesn't seem have the level of urgency that it may really need.

One thing that's very easy to do is to buy a reusable water bottle instead of buying bottled water. I started doing this myself

Lou

I gave up on the bottled water...we bought a water cooler...Hot tea and cold tea at your disposal!

Here in the Eastern Panhandle of West Virginia, I think a lot of the deer hit by cars get moved into the nearest field, where the TVs make short work of them.
Carol