5/24 Moment of Zen: SeaDump 2010

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch

With pollution in the Atlantic getting so much press these days, let's not forget the havoc we wreak in farther distant seas as well. What amounts to one of the world's largest landfills lives afloat the Pacific Ocean about a 1000 miles offshore from anywhere. About 10 million mi² composed of trash from at least three continents, approximately 80% of which washes out from land, the Garbage Patch is formed by a pattern of converging ocean currents called the North Pacific Gyre.

The Garbage Patch, for all its concentration, presents a difficult cleanup. It does not cohere into an "island of trash" but instead floats lots of pieces of debris in close quarters, largely under the surface. Additionally, floating matter of this becomes an unhealthy habitat for a number of marine species, which further complicates cleanup.

Click the picture above to read more from the National Science Foundation about the Garbage patch, or click here to read what Mother Nature News has to say.

On a related note, here's an article from the UK's Guardian newspaper about efforts underway to have the term "ecocide"—referring to actions which lead to the large-scale destruction of an ecosystem—recognized and established as a crime (to be tried by the International Criminal Court in the Hague, Netherlands) on par with genocide. The Guardian also has a photojournal of its Top 10 ecocides.