A Floating Island Of Garbage
What if there were a huge landfill almost the size of Texas somewhere on planet Earth, but it couldn’t be spotted by the naked eye, and better yet, you couldn’t even smell it?
The giant pacific garbage patch is not your usual garbage dump or landfill. It is in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, stretching between the coastline of North America and Japan and other Asian island countries. Scientists still cannot say for sure how big the patch is, because of how difficult it is to measure the boundaries of the patch. The existence of the patch was first predicted in the late 1980s by the American National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Charles Moore, an American oceanographer, was the first to run into the patch while taking a shortcut back from Hawaii to the United States. His route took him straight into the North Pacific Gyre, and he was surprised to find himself surrounded by miles and miles of floating garbage.
Now what is a gyre?
The earth has 5-6 major oceanic gyres - a swirling vortex within the ocean which is kept in place by a system of constantly rotating ocean currents. The largest is called the North Pacific Sub-tropical Gyre, which stretches from California to Japan.
The garbage patch is not visible from any satellite, nor does it have floating plastic bags, or aluminum cans - things that you would usually expect in a garbage patch. Instead, it consists mostly of broken down plastic debris and chemical waste, present at slightly below water level in the ocean.
How does the patch form? After all, it’s not like we send ships sailing out into the ocean to dump our land waste every day. What happens is that over the course of many years, the ocean currents (that form the gyre) pull waste and debris that accumulate on the coast lines into the ocean. The rotating currents then slowly pull it all together, thus forming a patch. The debris is mostly drawn from the coasts of North America, and Japan. While most of the debris is drawn from land, cruise ships and fishing trawlers also contribute to the patch.
Is the patch harmful?
Well, for one, the plastic debris can harm sea life, and can find its way into the sea food we eat. Plastic is not bio-degradable, which means it cannot be absorbed by the earth. In the ocean, due to the sun's ultraviolet rays and ocean currents, the plastic polymers get broken down into smaller particles. However they do not completely disappear. Some plastics have toxins that are slowly dissipated in the water.
The small plastic particles are mistaken for food and ingested by animals and birds, which poses a threat to their lives. Sometimes the marine animals get entangled in the plastic nets and rings.
What can you and I do?
We can consume fewer products that contain plastics or are packaged with plastics; we can use fewer plastic bags when we shop; we can be careful about disposing off waste by the ocean; we can make smart choices about traveling by ships or taking vacations at sea. So for instance, if your family is planning to go on a cruise, be sure to find out from the cruise company what methods they follow to dispose off their waste. If you eat fish, or other sea food, find out how the fish or sea food is grown and harvested.
Do you have more ideas on how we can reduce waste, either on land or at sea? Share your ideas with us!
Want to learn more?
Cartoonist Explains Pacific Garbage Patch with talking sealife
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i think they need to put trash cans every where were they liter we shold go green!!! go green!!!.
why do they litter they should just recycle
oh my goodness!!! so much litter!! it will kill all sorts of animals. Fish. Birds. we have to stop this! just if you see litter, pick it up! how hard can it be?
Aash J:
i agree. if there is litter, a trashcan could be right next to it. it is not like it is the end of the world if you do.
thats no good at all
i like turtles
hmmmm.We should all recycle a lot more.
I think that a floating island of rubbish is pretty wierd thing. And who would think to look for an island made of rubbish.
It is very easy just to help you know I live right by the ocean and I always have and I see more and more trash littering our beaches
people dont realize how much we are hurting our homes, family, our life by killing the earth.
I feel so bad for all of those birds and we should tell the people that live in hawai to stop littering! We have to do some thing about this!!!!!!
my opinion is that I think we need to make a change. I'm happy about having Disney Channel helping, but this is very important to REALLY make a change! This is really sad!
these types of organizations are what is going to help our future. we need more of these organizations in our world to keep it clean, safe, and existing
This makes me want to break down in tears. Think about the poor animals. They are thinking this is food but it really is like poison. Imagine if you were eating dinner and it tasted funny and a few days later you died. I don't think you would like that at all.
WOW that is a huge pile of garbage. I cant believe someone would do that.You got to REUSE,REDUCE, AND RECYCLE!
We should not pollute the waters. Soon we will run out of room for trash. We need to keep the waters clean or it will turn into a garbage island.
It worries me to find so much trash in the oceans. Poor animals, no wonder we find so many dead animals along the shore. We should take care of this earth like if we were taking of ourselves or our family.
me too, i dont want my baby sister growing up in a waste land
thats not cool. its wrong to do that to the environment
Its not right to litter so you need to stop, and make the world a better place.
c'mon people c'mon REUSE,REDUCE,RECYCLE
We need to somehow stop this 'Island of Garbage' from escalating and becoming a 'Planet of Garbage'. Minor measures of not littering or dumping waste and reusing items can make a huge difference. But this should be actively done by you, me and everyone else.
What methods are going to be used for recycling the waste? Could you state the procedures?
The pacific garbage patch seems to be such a huge horrible sight and of course it has been a very serious topic as the litter on the streets go into the ocean this really can contaminate all the things we need and other living things associated with that water
good for that guy! this is sad. way too much and needs to change.
Thats not good at all. Its dangerous. Somebody should do something about it.
I feel really bad about the adult birds and baby birds.
I'd really want to kill the person who EVER DID THAT!
I really can't believe that!!! I mean like, I would NEVER EVER DO THAT! I wish everybody would stop throwing garbage.
That`s horrible. Don`t people know how important the sea is?
Why do people litter? I wonder how that "floating island of garbage" can be cleaned. Armaan was right we do have ot recycle. Thank god that guy found it just floating around. Also Aash J thought that people are lazy, he is TRUE!
recycle now!
That is crazy!
i emailed a ? I was wondering how many ways i can help
recycle. why is it so big?
thats terrible just shows how we pp need to clean up our act a lot and asap
an island of garbadge? who would of thought? I hope the sea life isn't that much harmed. Who would trash the ocean like that? I wonder how big the island is.
Recycle please!!!!!!
this place is like a huge dump
this place was like a dumpster
Haril,
This article really stuck my interest. I may think about assigning this one. I had no idea about this "island of garbage"! Have you ever heard of anything like this before?
Wow That is so big!
The ocean is so beautiful. But that trash must have gathered with years and years of litter. How can anyone litter it is horrible for nature and it's animals.
Remember - you have an opportunity to ask questions on plastic, ocean currents or anything else that comes to your mind after reading the article. We have a special guest -- Lorraine Palmer, who will be happy to answer them.
a lot of people should not litter, but they do.
when we recycle we can use that material for more stuff. Plastic is made from crude oil and we`re already running low on oil or else the price would not be at $5
a lot of people should not litter it is so wrong and illegal!!!!
recycle. and don't litter
We all should recycle because i think that is not good
Can this floating pile of plastic and garbage be converted into something useful, like a renewable source of energy?
There is so much garbage that if it could be converted into energy it would be awesome!
It's scary how the little trash that we toss into the ocean goes into this massive piece of floating garbage. Don't litter, people! Let us do our part to save the Earth!
People should really try to clean that up for the water animals.That just shows how much trash and chemicals are released in the ocean.