Hawaiian beach turning into plastic

news.bbc.co.uk...

Worth reading the link and watching the video...

Basically...

The remote Kamilo Beach is now so full of plastic debris, from the ocean, it is almost impossible to tell the plastic from the sand.

Plastic does not bio-degrade and just breaks down into smaller and smaller piece... mixing with the sand and getting into the food chain.

The human race seriously needs to cut down on its dependence on plastics!!

Wow.

Sickingly amazing.

I am still trying to wrap my head around it. Its so simple, yet so devastating.

I guess maybe that is why the Gorillaz named their new album 'Plastic Beach'...

Honestly, star and flag.

This brings the issue of pollution to a whole new level.

The actual make up of the beach is just becoming plastic literally... A generation of petroleum plastic is starting to re-form the natural feature of the earth..

I'm just stunned. He kept digging and it was just more junk, more crap, more beads of plastic...

How are we ever going to clean up plastic sand?!

Thanks for bringing this to my attention.

You don't know the half of it. There was a plant that manufacturered plastic kiddy toys in the town where I grew up. The raw plastic was delivered to the plant in open box cars by rail. In its unprocessed state the plastic was in the form of tiny round beads that would act like quicksand if you were silly enough to climb into one of the box cars. We had several incidents of children drowning in the cars when I was growing up. Of course, once introduced into the environment in the form of bottles, or toys, or whatever these objects eventually start to break down and revert back to their original form, a.k.a. the very smooth, very round beads of plastic that claimed lives even before they were turned into something temporarily useful.

Again, these beads are very smooth and very round, so there is little friction generated between them if something heavy is placed upon them. If you step on a pile of them they simply roll around you and suck you down. Imagine a beach 20 years from now where the sand has been more or less replaced by tiny balls of plastic. Imagine pockets of plastic death lining the coastlines of the Earth and the horror that it will cause. Imagine once-prosperous vacation spots turned into ghost towns because you can't walk safely on the beaches anymore! And we're not even talking about all of the other toxic crap that we've been pumping into the environment for 50 years or so. The entire ecosystem has been polluted with unnatural chemicals and bio-resistant crap to the point that the stuff can now be found in every living thing on the planet. The hidden cost of cheap and convenient may well be our own demise as a species.

ahhh yes, the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is attacking hawaii!

freethinkerspress.files.wordpress.com...

Although many scientists suggest that the patch extends over a very wide area, with estimates ranging from an area the size of the state of Texas to one larger than the continental United States, the exact size is unknown.

en.wikipedia.org...

Atleast its not Jaws. But anyway, I do find this sad. Most humans can be such litter bugs.

yea..it's gonna get worse before it get's better...

en.wikipedia.org...

[edit on 24-4-2010 by baddmove]

What a mess, it reminds me of this news story I read last week -

A gray whale that died after getting stranded on a West Seattle beach had a large amount of garbage in its stomach — ranging from plastic bags to a pair of sweat pants and even a golf ball

www.msnbc.msn.com...

An bacteria has been discovered that can digest plastics and break it down but I'm not sure of the name of that particular bacteria but I know that some people don't want this information to be known for some reason. The latest that I know about this is a student who, after noting how some plastics degraded in the compost, isolated an certain bacteria to prove this bacteria could degrade plastics, and won an award at the science fair he competed in. I have not heard of him or his work since.

Thanks to all the disgusting, lazy slobs (industrial or general population) who throw all their junk into the sea, rivers, drains, roads and other places with runoff we have this problem.

We can't even help ourselves, no wonder the eilte wants to decimate us, we act like children!

This whole issue of the great pacific garbage patch was entirely unknown to me until I saw this thread.

All I can say after researching it for just 5 minutes, is that I am stunned to sickness. How can this be so downplayed. I mean i'm sure a lot of people do know about it but I am willing to bet less then 10% of the worlds population would be aware of it.

This ought to be the biggest co-operative project between the governmetns of the world ever.

**** space programs and election budgets, cosmetic research and just about everything that tptb shove down our throats to appease our vanity.

To me this is the single biggest issue I have come across here in my short time on ATS.

Couldn't they burn it all? or destroy it with acid or something. I know that wouldnt be very good for the oceans either but surely it would be better than leaving this tumour there to float.

Humanity should file one giant class action lawsuit to the Govt's, corparations and leaders of this world for encouraging us to **** up MY/YOUR PLANET.

I'm going to bed now to have nightmares

[edit on 25-4-2010 by da_ruse]

reply to post by da_ruse


Yeah da_ruse, it is pretty amazing. It shows how much we humans pollute and destroy the earth. It really bothers me and we are in big trouble.

It is bad enough that we wage wars over religion and power, but it is another thing to pollute the earth and kill all of the creatures that live here. Who are we, as humans, to do this to living beings? This hasn't been going on for centuries, it has only been going on for a few decades!

If we continue this way the whole ocean will be trash in a few decades! This will have major consequences to us humans. Birds and small fish will eat the plastic, which will in turn be food for larger fish and sea mammals. We eat those large fish and sea mammals, which are highly toxic.

In japan you can see how pollution is destroying the japanese people:

en.wikipedia.org...

Minamata Disease is a neurological syndrome caused by severe mercury poisoning. Symptoms include ataxia, numbness in the hands and feet, general muscle weakness, narrowing of the field of vision and damage to hearing and speech. In extreme cases, insanity, paralysis, coma and death follow within weeks of the onset of symptoms. A congenital form of the disease can also affect fetuses in the womb.

Minamata disease was first discovered in Minamata city in Kumamoto prefecture, Japan in 1956. It was caused by the release of methyl mercury in the industrial wastewater from the Chisso Corporation's chemical factory, which continued from 1932 to 1968. This highly toxic chemical bioaccumulated in shellfish and fish in Minamata Bay and the Shiranui Sea, which when eaten by the local populace resulted in mercury poisoning. While cat, dog, pig and human deaths continued over more than 30 years, the government and company did little to prevent the pollution.

If you think that is not bad enough, it is still going on!!! If you are really interested in this, you NEED to watch the documentary called "The Cove". They talk about Minamata disease and how after 30 years they are starting this problem all over again!

Dolphin meat sold to the Japanese people is highly contaminated with mercury, methylmercury, cadmium, DDT and PCBs. The Japanese government provides no warning that eating dolphin meat poses a serious health hazard.

Coalition member Elsa Nature Conservancy (ENC) of Japan is reporting that dolphin meat from a dolphin capture in Futo was highly contaminated with mercury. ENC acquired a slice of meat from a bottlenose dolphin that was butchered in Futo on November 11, 2004. ENC sent the sample to Hokkaido where Dr. Tetsuya Endo of the Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Health Science University of Hokkaido examined it for mercury contamination.

The dolphin meat was found to be highly polluted, containing 19.2ppm (parts per million) of mercury. This is 48 times higher than the maximum advisory level of 0.4ppm, set by the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry of Japan.

If that doesn't scare you, i don't know what will. What is even worse is that here in America we are having similar mercury problems with our fish!

Here is an article from a few days ago:
www.foxnews.com...

And another one from last year, this is a scary one:
abclocal.go.com.../lifestyle_community/green&id=6973770

A multi-year study discovered mercury in all 291 streams it checked, including some of the most popular for fishing in Northern California -- the Sacramento, San Joaquin and Carson rivers.

"If you're doing sport fishing and you're planning to bring that fish home to have for dinner or to barbecue, I'd be very concerned, I'd be very cautious before I would ingest any fish that might be contaminated," Dr. Clarence Braddock said.

Levels in 25 percent of the samples were above criteria for safe eating.

Scientists said old mines are the source of California's contamination.

Consider this, along with what ever the hell is in the meat that we all eat and your head may explode...

Imagine the massive feast bacteria will have when they evolve to consume plastics.

Its not so bad.....

Where do you think all this crap is coming from,Iknow he said the great Pacific ocean but i mean who is throwing all their garbage in there.I dont throw my garbage in there so why would someone else do it.I really dont understand the mentality of people who trash our planet its not hard to put stuff in recycle bins is it? One day we are going to end up eating this sh*t.

reply to post by 12voltz


Im pretty sure a lot of it comes from cargo ships . See here: en.wikipedia.org...

Sources of pollutants There is no strong scientific data concerning the origins of pelagic plastics. The figure that an estimated 80% of the garbage comes from land-based sources and 20% from ships, is derived from on an unsubstantiated estimate.[15]However, ship-generated pollution is a source of concern since a typical 3,000 passenger cruise ship produces over eight tons of solid waste weekly, some of which ends up in the patch.[16] Pollutants range in size from abandoned fishing nets to micro-pellets used in abrasive cleaners.[17] Currents carry debris from the west coast of North America to the gyre in about six years [1], and debris from the east coast of Asia in a year or less.[18][19] An international research project led by Dr. Hideshige Takada of Tokyo University studying plastic pellets, or nurdles, from beaches around the world may provide further clues about the origins of pelagic plastic.[20]

reply to post by 12voltz


Good ol' America and China! Japan too.

from the wiki page on the patch:
en.wikipedia.org...

Currents carry debris from the west coast of North America to the gyre in about six years [1], and debris from the east coast of Asia in a year or less.[18][19] An international research project led by Dr. Hideshige Takada of Tokyo University studying plastic pellets, or nurdles, from beaches around the world may provide further clues about the origins of pelagic plastic.[20]

reply to post by bluemooone2


A lot? Compared to the land it is very small percentage.

reply to post by Wertdagf


Exactly. The oxygen we breathe and depend on was the waste product of another creature.

When humans pollute and overpopulate themselves into extinction, the next forms of life will evolve to take advantage of the plethora of rubbish we have left behind just as we have managed to exploit the waste left by those who came before us.

Life will march on, though we wont.

Originally posted by star in a jar
An bacteria has been discovered that can digest plastics and break it down but I'm not sure of the name of that particular bacteria but I know that some people don't want this information to be known for some reason. The latest that I know about this is a student who, after noting how some plastics degraded in the compost, isolated an certain bacteria to prove this bacteria could degrade plastics, and won an award at the science fair he competed in. I have not heard of him or his work since.

Your right we do know how to solve this problem,The problem is theres no money to be made in doing so. At least not yet but heres the amazing part this kids bacteria was for a science fair i guess when you need a problem solved find some high school kids.lol
www.mnn.com...





[edit on 4/25/10 by dragonridr]

For me the solution is simple... Although plastic eating bacteria are a great idea, they are a fix rather than prevention... What we really need to do is STOP the plastic getting there in the first place! Plastic is being dumped into the oceans at an alarming rate.

Manufacturers are the ones who need to take responsibility... Plastic is the "cheap" alternative to glass, metal or paper!!!

Ban the use of plastic in, cups, milk containers, Jerry cans, Toys, bags, Food containers, bleach and cleaning products etc...

All of these items can be made from either Glass, Wood, Paper or Metal!!

Until people are forced to place the environment above convenience, and financial cheapness, this problem will only get worse!

Another mentality we need to get away from is this "life will go on, nature will find a way around us" type attitude...

I'm sure that nature will... but that’s no good for our Children!!! The fight MUST start here... and it must start with you! Try to reduce your own dependence on plastics... try to use paper shopping bags (often made from recycled paper) Try to re-use any bottles our jars you have instead of those silly tupperware plastic containers. Recycle you waste and lobby your local government... and when you vote, put environmental issues up there with your list of things you want your governments to prioritise!!

We need to discourage this nonchalant bravado we are seeing from more and more people!!! The “i’m gonna burn car tyres in my back yard for earth day” type attitude and “F*** the whales” bumper stickers.
What message is this sending to our kids??? That its ok to pollute our own home and hunt entire species to extinction??? These tiny-minded idiots are not helping!

We need to act now!

The guy in the video summed it up best when he said...

“We are soiling our own nest”


[edit on 25-4-2010 by Muckster]

reply to post by Muckster


So very sad to actually see happen in my lifetime things like this that were predicted in the 60's and 70's, these atrocities were inevitable unless man took the initiative and stopped being such a pig, stop or slow production of some plastic and rubber products, instead they invented more plastic products, and the bottled water industry is the worst of all. If earth shook us all off like fleas right now it would only be fair.