Thousands of Rubber Ducks to Finally End Journey 210
Bert de Jong writes "The Daily Mail reports that thousands of rubber ducks who have traveled the seas of the world since 1992 are about to end their journey. After escaping out of a container fallen off a Chinese freight ship in a storm, scientists have been followed them on their fifteen year trek. This has turned out to be an invaluable source of information for studying ocean currents. Now it seems inevitable though that they will finally land on the shores of South-West England. '[Oceanographer Curtis Ebbesmeyer] correctly predicted what many thought was impossible - that thousands of them would end up washed into the Arctic ice near Alaska, and then move at a mile a day, frozen in the pack ice, around their very own North-West Passage to the Atlantic. It proved true years later and in 2003, the first Friendly Floatees were found, frozen and then thawed out, on the eastern seaboard of the U.S. and Canada. So precious to science are they that the US firm that made them is offering a £50 bounty for finding one.'"
Quack! (Score:0, Informative)
Harper's article on the floatees (Score:5, Informative)
Also, if you're interested in this stuff, you might want to check out Ebbesmeyer's website and newsletter about beachcombing: http://beachcombersalert.org/ [beachcombersalert.org]
Re:How can they identify one ducky from another? (Score:3, Informative)
New Scientists take on this press release (Score:5, Informative)
So here is the link to a more sensible website:
http://environment.newscientist.com/article/dn121
Old News (Score:4, Informative)
In late May of 1990, the container vessel Hansa Carrier encountered a severe storm in the north Pacific Ocean (~48N, 161W) on its passage from Korea to the United States. During the storm, a large wave washed twenty-one shipping containers overboard. Five of these 20-metre containers held a shipment of approximately 80,000 Nike shoes ranging from children's shoes to large hiking boots. It has been estimated that four of the five containers opened into the stormy waters, releasing over 60,000 shoes into the north Pacific Ocean.
1998 was exceptionally hot, but the trend still... (Score:3, Informative)
Do you have other facts to share? ;p
Re:How can they identify one ducky from another? (Score:3, Informative)
Dilution is the solution to pollution.
In fact, in some municipalities, waste into the sewer system is allowed below a certain concentration, but get above that concentration and get fined. So you can (and some do) simply add water when dumping stuff down the drain. Environmentally this makes little sense as it's the same amount of "bad stuff" going down the drain, but in the allowed case you're also "wasting" lots of water. (this ignores the issue of high concentrations being bad for the piping system of course).
Re:Moby Dick doesn't have an outhouse (Score:2, Informative)
Consider the difference between the amount of excretia generated by even the largest shoal of fish (or even Moby Dick) and the amount generated by a human population centre of any size, lets say a city of 100,000+, of which there are many around the coasts of the world.
Add to that the fact that the shoal of fish, and especially Moby Dick, will be mobile and deposit the excretia over a significant area whereas sewage outlet pipes aren't particularly known for their mobility.
It's the sheer concentration involved with urban human population which makes simply dumping the stuff at sea bad for the environment because it seriously disturbs the balance.
Otherwise, by a similar argument, we might as well be dumping our sewage in the street as they used to; after all, all other animals shit where they stand.
BBC Radio Documentary From 2006 (Score:3, Informative)
Re:How can they identify one ducky from another? (Score:2, Informative)
And hydrogen! Attracted to each other through quantum electrostatic forces! And unless those forces are overcome, that oxygen won't be available for deep sea dwellers to breathe! That was their point!