Where is All the 'Missing' Plastic? At the Bottom of the Ocean, Study Finds [View all]

[adirondacker]

'The deep sea floor could be the ultimate resting ground for the products of our disposable society,' researcher says
by
Deirdre Fulton, staff writer

"Billions of tiny plastic fragments have accumulated in the deep sea, finds a new study published this week in the journal Royal Society Open Science, raising concerns about the organisms that live there, such as coral and bottom-of-the-food-chain invertebrates.

In an attempt to find evidence of "missing" plastic debris—unaccounted for microplastic waste that should, given our "throw-away culture," be more abundant in the world's oceans—scientists looked at samples of sediment and coral retrieved from 16 sites in the Mediterranean Sea, the North Atlantic Ocean, and southwestern Indian Ocean.

What they found suggests that "[t]he deep sea floor could be the ultimate resting ground for the products of our disposable society," said Richard Thompson, a marine biologist at Plymouth University in the UK and an author of the study."

http://www.commondreams.org/news/2014/12/17/where-all-missing-plastic-bottom-ocean-study-finds

link to the study;
http://www.nature.com/news/plastic-waste-taints-the-ocean-floors-1.16581

I can recall the first time I saw the Gulf Stream wall back in '99. It was lined with plastic trash for miles.