Pacific Ocean Garbage Patch Worries Researchers 296
NeverVotedBush writes with an update to a story we discussed early this month about an enormous accumulation of garbage and plastic debris in the Pacific Ocean, a thousand miles off the coast of California. The team of scientists has now returned from their expedition to examine the area and say they "found much more debris than they expected." The team will start running tests on the samples they retrieved, and they are preparing to visit another section of ocean they suspect will be full of trash.
"The Scripps team hopes the samples they gathered during the trip nail down answers to questions of the trash's environmental impact. Does eating plastic poison plankton? Is the ecosystem in trouble when new sea creatures hitchhike on the side of a water bottle? Plastics have entangled birds and turned up in the bellies of fish, and one paper cited by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration estimates 100,000 marine mammals die trash-related deaths each year. The scientists hope their data gives clues as to the density and extent of marine debris, especially since the Great Pacific Garbage Patch may have company in the Southern Hemisphere, where scientists say the gyre is four times bigger. 'We're afraid at what we're going to find in the South Gyre, but we've got to go there,' said Tony Haymet, director of the Scripps Institution."
Is it full of (Score:3, Funny)
Earth Plus Plastic. (Score:5, Funny)
This story remind me of the George Carlin bit on the environment:
Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn (Score:5, Funny)
We're afraid at what we're going to find in the South Gyre, but we've got to go there,' said Tony Haymet, director of the Scripps Institution.
Famous last words before being eaten by Cthulhu.
Re:Is it full of (Score:2, Funny)
Some people probably don't realize but Garbage Pail Kids actually exist. It's an old 80s phenomenon that we used to trade:
LINK - http://www.lmgtfy.com/?q=Garbage+Pail+kids [lmgtfy.com]
Re:Overreaction (Score:2, Funny)
Don't mess with plastic Texas!
Do your part for the mother earth (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Where do you put it? (Score:2, Funny)
The Atlantic.
Re:Overreaction (Score:3, Funny)
Yeah and they really stood the test of time.
Sponge Bob and Mr. Krab (Score:3, Funny)
Re:This is not complicated. (Score:3, Funny)
I still don't see how we get to 6. Profit! from here
Re:This is not complicated. (Score:3, Funny)
What competes with the microbes for consuming plastic?
They're not consuming plastic anymore...
Plastic eating microbes find something else they like that taste's better
They're eating tasty fish/people
Re:Do your part for the mother earth (Score:2, Funny)
Yeah, by eating cheetos you help to reduce the styrofoam pollution
Re:Where do you put it? (Score:2, Funny)
>And where do you put it?
People keep bringing up Texas...