One-Day Ocean Cleanup Recovers 10 Million Pieces Of Garbage On Coastlines Worldwide

[hatrack]

More than 10 million pieces of trash were plucked from the world's waterways in a single day last year. But for Philippe Cousteau, the beach sandals that washed up in the Norwegian arctic symbolized the global nature of the problem of marine debris. "We saw flip-flops washing ashore on these islands in far northern Norway near the Arctic Circle," Cousteau, a conservationist and grandson of famed oceanographer Jacques Cousteau, said in a telephone interview.

Cousteau was commenting on marine debris statistics released Tuesday by the Ocean Conservancy group. "People don't wear flip-flops in the Arctic, at least not if they're sane," Cousteau said. "I think people are starting ... to realize that this is a global problem."

The report detailed the amount and kind of trash that volunteers gathered on one day in 2009 along coastlines of six continents and the banks of inland waterways, stressing that as much as 80 percent of marine litter starts on land. "Trash travels, and no beach, lakeshore or riverfront is untouched -- no matter how remote," Vikki Spruill, Ocean Conservancy's CEO, wrote in the report's introduction.

Last year, 10,239,538 pieces of junk were retrieved from shorelines on one day, September 19, 2009, by about half a million volunteers in the conservancy's annual international coastal cleanup. This year's cleanup day is September 25. More than 40 percent of that total was collected in the United States, including everything from bottle caps and plastic six-pack holders to cigarette butts, washing machines, construction materials, diapers, condoms and medical waste. The United States had the most volunteers, nearly triple the number in the Philippines, which had the second-most.

EDIT

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE63C42420100413

EDIT

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE63C42420100413

[Terry in Austin]

1. Flip-flops

The volume of crud in the oceans is hard to comprehend. Just the flip-flops, even. They float; they're chronic.

Saw a show on one of the nature channels recently about these places in Kenya that have gotten overwhelmed by current-borne heaps of flip-flops. So the people there began rounding them up and turning them into sculptures. (More here.) Some of the pieces were quite large, but no match for the flood of footwear.

A plucky response to a dismaying problem, gotta say.

[bemildred]

2. The volume of plastic crud everywhere is hard to comprehend.

No offense intended, but it isn't just the oceans, it's everywhere.

[cutlassmama]

3. Seems like a lot of people in Kenya could use flip flops as footwear.

Free shoes for all.