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Scientists say the Great Pacific Garbage Patch now thrives with life

Catwell

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Blue sea dragons, which have armor made of man-o-war prey they hunted, are living in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. (Image Credit: Rebecca Helm/Twitter)

I've been so worried about the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. It's a monument to environmental disasters. Or so I thought. It seems life has found a way.

Ben Lecomte, an elite distance swimmer, recently discovered life loitering around the edge of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch as he approached that area. Researchers from various universities around the world captured and investigated his findings. Among them, the University of North Carolina's Rebecca Helm explained the study on Twitter. She also posted remarkable images and videos of the animals living in the patch.

A video posted by Helm shows blue sea dragons swimming around. "The blue sea dragons… eat man-o-war and steal their stinging cells. Covering their bodies in an armor made from the weapons of their vanquished prey," said Helm. She also said it's not a great idea to clean the area with physical nets and plastic removal because the patch houses all sorts of fishes and animals. One way to solve this issue involves preventing plastic pollution at the source to stop the patch from increasing in size.

Placing nets in the water to capture garbage also removes the animals. Helm showed this issue occurring in 2019, where life was removed during initial cleanup efforts. Cleanup efforts in 2021 also raised concerns for the same reasons. Then, earlier this year, a non-profit called the Ocean Cleanup faced allegations of faking the photos of the plastic collection.

"Earlier this year, I warned that @TheOceanCleanup would catch and kill floating marine life. This week they announced they're collecting plastic, and their picture shows HUNDREDS of floating animals trapped with plastic (red circles). We need to talk about this," Helm posted on Twitter.  

Have a story tip? Message me at: http://twitter.com/Cabe_Atwell

  • A good example to show how the planet actually compensates for our throw away society by creating an environment from an unexpected problem.

    I too deplore that fact that the accumulated plastic exists from our foolish practice of making things to just throw away.

    Personally, I would prefer to go to glass or aluminum reusable containers and entice recycling with a deposit. I collect bottles when I was a kid for spending money. I discovered the mother lode was beer bottles over soda bottles.

    I can see where the floating plastic would create an artificial floating island, which would have a lot of benefits for some types of marine life.

    Over time, they would also trap surface dust to create soil in which plants could live and grow.

    We forget that nature understands how to change to survive. Too many people think that we can preserve the current state of the planet forever. They are ignorant of the geologic record that identifies only two steady states for the planet, cold earth and warm earth. We are currently transitioning from cold earth to warm earth. I prefer warm earth, it provides a much more livable environment for life, gives us a lot of arable land, fresh water via rain nearly daily with no snow or ice.

    If you are concerned with the current cycle of change, then you have to understand that the transition has another 35,000 years to go. There is no need to panic.