For Authors - Ocean Publishing

Gargantuan Garbage Gripes

A decade ago, a massive assemblage of refuse was discovered in waters between Hawaii and California-it came to be known as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. Caused by a convergence of tides carrying trash debris from all over the globe, scientists predicted that similar masses could be found elsewhere in the world's oceans, but until now those predictions hadn't been confirmed.

Recently, however, it seems the discovery of another island-sized pool of pollution in the Atlantic, a giant swirling convergence in the Sargasso Sea, has proved those theories correct.

What's interesting about this liquid dumpsite is that, in essence, it's basically invisible. Because of the clashing tide directions, the materials comprising the Atlantic patch is so constantly thrashed and ravaged, in a constant state of movement and collision, that a majority of the plastics, etc. have been mostly broken down into a dangerous soup of tiny shards and fragments.

The location with the highest concentrations of plastics lies between 22 and 38 degrees north latitude, an offshore patch roughly equivalent to the area between Cuba and Washington, D.C. An average concentration of plastic in this area is estimated at about 4,000 pieces per square mile, though it is as high as 250,000 pieces per square mile in some places.

Despite the seemingly meager size of individual plastic pieces in this patch, the debris found there is harmful for fish, larger sea mammals and even potentially humans. The waste that isn't trapped inside animals' digestive tracts can leave toxic remnants in their blood streams, remnants that over time will trickle up the food chain.

As Lisa DiPinto of the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration says: "That plastic has the potential to impact our resources and impact our economy."

As is always the case, this new patch of pollution is not an isolated incident but a sign of larger and more serious problems. Sea pollution is not confined to single territories-it is not a U.S. or a U.K. issue; it's global. There might not be any realistic way of cleaning already-soiled seas, but advocates believe that by raising awareness, maybe even challenging our "throwaway" culture (which uses non-biodegradable materials for disposable products), we could stop another one of these patches from cropping up in the future-and in turn, stop a more serious natural/economic catastrophe from occurring.

Until then, here's hoping that nature will break down these plastics for us and return itself to equilibrium. Hey, it might only take a few hundred years. Or a maybe few millennia.