In the Pacific Ocean is an unusual island that is not marked on any map of the world. Meanwhile, the area of this place, which has become a real shame on our planet, already exceeds the territory of France. The fact is that mankind produces garbage that is increasing every day and covering new territories not only on earth. Extremely affected are residents of aquatic ecosystems, who have felt in recent decades all the delights of civilization.
Unfortunately, most people are not aware of the real environmental situation and the dirty heritage of humanity. The problem of marine litter, causing irreparable damage to the environment, is not publicized, and yet, according to approximate estimates, the weight of the plastic that releases toxic substances is more than one hundred million tons.
How does trash get into the ocean?
Where does garbage in the ocean come from if a person does not live there? More than 80% of the waste comes from ground-based sources, and the bulk of them are plastic water bottles, bags, and glasses. In addition, fishing nets and lost containers from ships appear at sea. The main pollutants are two countries - China and India, where residents dump garbage directly into the water.
Two sides of plastic
We can say that from the moment plastic was invented, the total pollution of the green planet began. Material that greatly facilitated people's lives has turned into a real poison for the earth and ocean when it gets there after use. Decaying for over a hundred years, cheap plastic, which is so easy to dispose of, causes serious damage to nature.
This problem has been rumored for over fifty years, but ecologists sounded the alarm only at the beginning of 2000, as a new continent consisting of waste appeared on the planet. Underwater currents brought down plastic litter in the garbage islands in the ocean, which were in a kind of trap and can not go beyond it. It is not possible to say exactly how much junk the planet stores.
Trash Island of Death
The greatest landfill in the Pacific basin goes 30 meters deep and stretches hundreds of kilometers from California to the Hawaiian Islands. For decades, plastic floated in the water until a huge island was formed from it, growing at a catastrophic pace. According to researchers, its mass now exceeds the mass of zooplankton by almost seven times.
The Pacific garbage island, made of plastic, which crumbles into small pieces under the influence of salt and the sun, is held in one place thanks to underwater currents. There is a subtropical whirlpool, which is called the "desert of the oceans." Various rubbish has been brought here from many parts of the world for many years, and due to the abundance of rotting corpses of animals, wet wood, the water is saturated with hydrogen sulfide. This is a real dead zone, extremely poor in life. In a fetid place where fresh wind never blows, merchant ships and warships, trying to avoid it, do not enter.
But after the 50s of the last century, the situation deteriorated sharply, and plastic packaging, bags and bottles that were not subjected to biological decay were added to the remains with algae. Now the Pacific island garbage island, the area of which is increasing several times every ten years, is 90% polyethylene.
Danger to birds and marine life
Mammals living in water take waste products that get stuck in the stomach and soon die. They get entangled in trash, receiving fatal injuries. Birds feed their chicks with small sharp granules resembling eggs, which leads to their death. Ocean debris is dangerous for humans, because many marine inhabitants falling into it are poisoned with plastic.
Debris floating on the surface of the ocean blocks the sun's rays, which threatens the normal functioning of plankton and algae, which support the ecosystem by producing nutrients. Their disappearance will lead to the death of many species of marine life. A garbage island made of plastic that does not decompose in water is fraught with danger for all living things.
Giant garbage dump
Recent studies by scientists have shown that the bulk of the debris is the smallest plastic particles about five millimeters in size, which are distributed both on the surface and in the middle layers of water. Because of this, it is not possible to determine the true extent of pollution, since it is impossible to see a garbage island in the Pacific Ocean from a satellite or aircraft. Firstly, about 70% of the rubbish sinks to the bottom, and secondly, transparent plastic particles lie beneath the surface of the water, and to see them from a height is simply unrealistic. A giant plastic spot can be seen only from a ship that came close to it, or diving with a scuba gear. Some scientists claim that its area is approximately 15 million kilometers.
Changing ecosystem balance
When studying pieces of plastic found in water, it was found that they are densely populated with microbes: about a thousand bacteria were found on one millimeter, both harmless and capable of causing disease. It turned out that garbage is changing the ocean, and it is impossible to predict what consequences it will lead to, but people are very dependent on the existing ecosystem.
The Pacific spot is not the only garbage dump on the planet; there are five more large and several small dumps in the waters of Antarctica and Alaska in the world. No specialist can say for sure what is the degree of their pollution.
Pathfinder of the island of floating rubbish
Of course, the existence of such a phenomenon as a garbage island was predicted by well-known oceanographers for a long time, but only 20 years ago captain C. Moore returning from the regatta discovered millions of plastic particles around his yacht. He did not even realize that he had swum in a garbage can, which had no end. Charles, who became interested in the problem, founded an environmental organization dedicated to the study of the Pacific Ocean.
From the reports of the yachtsman, where he warned of a threat looming over humanity, at first they simply dismissed it. And only after a severe storm, which threw tons of plastic garbage on the beaches of the Hawaiian Islands, which caused the death of thousands of animals and birds, the surname Mura became known throughout the world.
Warnings
After research, during which carcinogenic substances used in the manufacture of refillable bottles were discovered in seawater, the American cautioned that continued use of polyethylene would threaten the entire planet. "The chemical-absorbing plastic is incredibly toxic, " said the discoverer of the island, which is made up of floating rubbish. "Marine life absorbs poison, and the ocean turns into a plastic soup."
First, garbage particles are in the stomachs of underwater inhabitants, and then migrate to the plates of people. So polyethylene becomes a link in the food chain, which for people is fraught with deadly diseases, because scientists have long proved the presence of plastic in the human body.
"The animal, torn off the leash"
A garbage island, on the surface of which you can’t walk, consists of the smallest particles forming a muddy soup. Environmentalists compared him to a large animal, which is lowered from a leash. As soon as the garbage reaches land, chaos begins. There are cases when the beaches were covered with plastic "confetti", which not only spoiled the vacation for tourists, but also led to the death of sea turtles.
However, the garbage island that destroys the natural ecosystem, the photo of which has gone around all the world publications devoted to ecology, is gradually turning into a real atoll with a solid surface. And this is very scary for modern scientists who believe that soon cluttered areas will become whole continents.
Landfill
More recently, the public was shocked by the fact that in the Maldives, where the tourism industry is extremely developed, too much trash is formed. Luxury hotels do not sort it for further processing, as the rules require, but unload it in a single pile. Some boaters who do not want to wait in line for the dumping of waste simply throw it into the water, and what remains remains on the artificially created garbage island Tilafushi, which has turned into a city landfill.
This corner, not reminiscent of paradise, is located near the capital of the Maldives. A cloud of black smog from bonfires with rubbish hung over a place where residents were trying to find items suitable for sale that were different from the usual resorts. The landfill is expanding towards the sea, and severe pollution of water has already begun, and the government has not solved the problem of waste disposal. There are tourists coming to Tilafushi specifically in order to look at a man-made disaster nearby.
Frightening facts
In 2012, specialists from the Scripps Institute of Oceanography examined contaminated sites off the coast of California and found that in just forty years, the amount of garbage increased a hundred times. And this state of affairs is very worrying for researchers, because there is a high probability that there will come a time when it will be impossible to fix anything.
