Great Pacific Garbage Patch

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'Worrying' Find Made in Pacific Plastic Research
'Worrying' Find Made in
Pacific Plastic Research
NEW STUDY
Mar 21, 2024 10:30 AM CDT

'Worrying' Find Made in Pacific Plastic Research

Researchers discover high concentration of microplastics in an unexpected area

(Newser) - The plastic problem in the world's oceans is a lot bigger than the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, researchers say. In a study published in the journal Environmental Science & Technology , researchers say they used a catamaran to measure plastic waste and microplastics in nine spots in the open ocean...

Surprising Species Are Finding Home in Pacific Garbage Patch

Coastal creatures are thriving far from their native homes, with unknown consequences

(Newser) - Communities of coastal creatures are thriving far from home in the swirling trash soup that is the Great Pacific Garbage Patch . Researchers have found dozens of creatures normally found near coasts—including crustaceans, sea anemones, mollusks, and worms—surviving and reproducing on plastic waste in the huge patch between Hawaii...

24-Year-Old Relaunches Device to Trap Ocean Plastic

After 4 months of repair, Boyan Slat's floating boom is back at it in the Pacific Ocean

(Newser) - A floating device designed to catch plastic waste has been redeployed in a second attempt to clean up a huge island of trash swirling in the Pacific Ocean between California and Hawaii. Boyan Slat, the 24-year-old creator of the Ocean Cleanup project, announced on Twitter that a 2,000-foot-long floating...

Another Setback for Ocean Cleanup Device

Repairs and upgrades are on tap

(Newser) - Great Pacific Garbage Patch: 2, Wilson: 0. That’s the score some two months after Dutch nonprofit Ocean Cleanup launched a plastic collection system, nicknamed Wilson, designed to capture trash floating in the Pacific Ocean between California and Hawaii. Wilson, a 2,000-foot-long U-shaped barrier that collects plastic in a...

24-Year-Old's Plan to Clean Up Ocean Plastic Gets a Tweak

Boyan Slat says a fix is in the works

(Newser) - A floating device sent to corral a swirling island of trash between California and Hawaii has not swept up any plastic waste—but the young innovator behind the project said Monday that a fix is in the works. Boyan Slat, 24, who launched the Pacific Ocean cleanup project, said the...

Swimmer Begins Record Japan-California Attempt
Swimmer Begins Record
Japan-California Attempt
in case you missed it
Jun 9, 2018 11:30 AM CDT

Swimmer Begins Record Japan-California Attempt

Frenchman plans to swim 8 hours a day

(Newser) - Ben Lecomte has set off from Japan in an effort to swim to California, undaunted by sharks, low temperatures, fierce weather, a gigantic garbage patch—and the fact that nobody has even swum across the Pacific before. But the 51-year-old Frenchman has the right experience to attempt the record-breaking open-water...

Study Shows Depressing Scope of Great Pacific Garbage Patch

Mass of floating garbage is 'increasing exponentially'

(Newser) - Already the largest floating trash island in the world, researchers have found the mass of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is "increasing exponentially," the Washington Post reports. “I’ve been doing this research for a while, but it was depressing to see,” the Guardian quotes...

Al Gore Is the First Citizen of the 'Trash Isles'

Activists want garbage patch to be new country

(Newser) - Campaigners want a vast area of floating garbage in the ocean to be the world's newest country—and they've already got more would-be citizens than some real countries. Al Gore is on board as the first honorary citizen of the "Trash Isles," which is what activists...

Pacific Garbage Patch a 'Ticking Time Bomb'

Floating mass of trash even bigger than once thought

(Newser) - The Great Pacific Garbage Patch that floats between California and Hawaii is even bigger than scientists believed—about twice the size of Texas, specifically. "We were surrounded by an endless layer of garbage," a marine biologist who works for the Ocean Cleanup, which ran a survey expedition that...

Amount of Plastic in Ocean: 700 Pieces per Human
Amount of Plastic in Ocean: 700 Pieces per Human
STUDY SAYS
Dec 11, 2014 8:17 AM CST

Amount of Plastic in Ocean: 700 Pieces per Human

Estimate taken from 24 ocean expeditions from 2007 to 2013

(Newser) - Mother Earth has reached a milestone, but not the kind anyone will want to celebrate: The plastic floating in the oceans has been estimated to the tune of 5 trillion pieces in a new study. That's 250,000 tons, or some 700 pieces per person, the Washington Post reports....

99% of Ocean Plastic Is AWOL

 99% of Ocean Plastic Is AWOL 
in case you missed it
Jul 5, 2014 11:00 AM CDT

99% of Ocean Plastic Is AWOL

Bad news: It's probably entering our food chain

(Newser) - Millions of tons of plastic thought to be floating around the world’s oceans have gone missing. But that's not the good news one might think. According to a new study , marine animals could be ingesting our garbage, reports the Verge . Up to 99% of the most microscopic plastic...

Fresh Lead in Jet Search? 122 'Potential Objects'

They were spotted via satellite Sunday, but could just be sea junk

(Newser) - The search for debris from Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 is facing a major obstacle in addition to bad weather: a sea full of garbage. The objects spotted in satellite images could be jet debris, but they could just as easily be some of the large quantities of the trash (think...

Sailor's Discovery: 'The Ocean Is Dead'

 Sailor's Discovery: 
 'The Ocean Is Dead' 
in case you missed it
Oct 26, 2013 7:03 AM CDT

Sailor's Discovery: 'The Ocean Is Dead'

Yachtsman shares ominous tale

(Newser) - As far as first-person tales go, Ivan Macfadyen's story of sailing from Melbourne to San Francisco is more than a little ominous. The yachtsman's springtime voyage was broken into two legs, with a stop in Osaka in the middle; it's a trip he made 10 years ago,...

Even Barnacles Eating Our Plastic Trash

 Even Barnacles Eating 
 Our Plastic Trash 
new study
Oct 24, 2013 1:57 PM CDT

Even Barnacles Eating Our Plastic Trash

33% of barnacles in study had ingested a microplastic

(Newser) - Today's most unfortunate number: 267. That's the number of marine species that have been found to have eaten plastic, and a new study zeroes in on one such species— barnacles. Researchers traveled to the North Pacific Gyre (better known as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch ) with a...

Lake Erie's Garbage Patch May Be Worst of All

Scientists find concentrations of plastic denser than those in ocean

(Newser) - Huge swaths of plastic floating in the ocean get all the attention as emblems of nasty pollution, but rival patches closer to home in Lake Erie are in some ways worse, reports the Atlantic Cities blog. A new study finds that the lake has dense patches of tiny bits of...

Expedition Charts 'Plasticized' Pacific

'Synthetic soup' extends far into western Pacific

(Newser) - An expedition charting the "Great Pacific Garbage Patch" has been hauling out depressing amounts of plastic from the little-studied waters of the western North Pacific gyre. "We've been finding lots of micro plastics, all the size of a grain of rice or a small marble," the...

Plastic in Pacific Has Grown 100-Fold Since 1970s

Study takes a look at the 'Great Pacific Garbage Patch'

(Newser) - Humanity has tossed a lot of plastic into the Pacific Ocean in the last 40 years. The level of small plastic pieces in the so-called "Great Pacific Garbage Patch" has increased 100-fold over that span, the Scripps Institution of Oceanography found in a new study. "We did not...

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