AT: Many, perhaps most, Americans believe that a vast accumulation of (mostly plastic) garbage is floating somewhere out in the Pacific Ocean, a non-biodegradable stain on humanity, choking and deforming fish. But apparently, that is just a myth. Kip Hansen writing in Watts Up With That? cites NOAA’s Ocean Service — Office of Response and Restoration:
“The NOAA Marine Debris Program’s Carey Morishige takes down two myths floating around with the rest of the debris about the garbage patches in a recent post on the Marine Debris Blog:
1. There is no “garbage patch,” a name which conjures images of a floating landfill in the middle of the ocean, with miles of bobbing plastic bottles and rogue yogurt cups. Morishige explains this misnomer:
Damn this is disheartening news, all this time I thought it (“Great Pacific Garbage Patch”) was in reference to California.
I watched a deal on this over a year ago. 90% of the episode was trying to get there and along the way all the random shit they found. A bottle here, a dirty diaper there, a buoy, six pack rings, etc. When they finally got to where the pile was, it wasn’t much more than maybe a dumpster or two worth of shit, mostly plastic bottles.
Go ahead, search for aerial pictures of this supposedly enormous flotilla of garbage, I did after I watched that episode. Nothing to be found. You’d think Greenpeace or some other Soros funded entity would have put up a few thousand bucks to charter an aircraft to survey the site by now.
You’re probably thinking of the Great Fruit Orchards of Northwestern Mexico.
🙂
The media can push any talking point any time. That’s why I don’t watch the
News.
I thought it was marketing for the new line of Garbage Patch Dolls
What is also generally ignored is that USA is responsible for less than 1% of the annual contribution of plastic waste to the oceans. India and China are responsible for far, far more.
Ha! You don’t even have to go out to the middle of the Pacific to find a hideous “patch” of garbage. The Pearl river, a main traffic line to shipping out of Guanzhou, is so thick with toxic waste, it looks like a combination of used anti-freeze and crankcase oil. And it bubbles. Its state dwarfs anything you’ve ever heard about the Hudson. It would be horrible to ever fall into.
But Cleveland’s own Cuyahoga River still has the distinction of catching fire multiple times.
http://clevelandhistorical.org/items/show/63
Burn dat river!
#OilSlicksMatter