Garbage Island - Great Pacific Garbage Patch

Imagine an Area twice the size of Texas now imagine the same area filled with plastic waste and floating in the Ocean. The Great Pacific Garbage Patch could easily be declared a country considering it is twice the Size of France.

Notabale Facts about Garbage Island :-

• Spread Across an area of around 1.6 Million Square Kilometres.

• It is not visible from space or sky because it is made up of Micro Plastics.

• The Patch was discovered in 1997 by a yachtsman named Charles Moore.

• Two Advertising agents petitioned the United Nations to actually declare it a country named " Trash Isles" with former American Vice President Al Gore as its first citizen.

• Total of 79,000 Metric Tons of Plastic waste is spread across the area.(79000 Metric tons = 500 Jumbo Jets)

• A Major portion of the Gyre is Fishing Nets which accounts for 46% of the total plastics.

To Understand how this mess was created we need to focus on how much waste is being dumped in the Ocean every year.Around 8 Million Tons of Plastics is dumped into the ocean every year i.e. one Garbage Truck every minute for the the entire year. Once this waste reaches the Oceans it is pulled into one of the Five Gyres in the Ocean, one of which is the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. The currents in these Gyres are circular in nature hence they allow the plastics to accumulate,circulate and break down.

How it affects Humans ?

We get affected when these plastics enter the food chain. The marine life is likely to continue consuming this trash and then dying because of it. If the same marine life is consumed by the Humans, which is very likely as we all love sea food, then the effects will likely show on us.

Humans are the most evolved species on the planet. And we ought to act responsible else we ourselves will destroy our own habitat "Earth"