Japanese Debris Floating Towards USA West Coast

[kach22i]

Japan earthquake and tsunami debris floating towards US West Coast | Mail Online

Japanese Debris Floating Towards USA West Coast
A vast field of debris, swept out to sea following the Japan earthquake and tsunami, is floating towards the U.S. West Coast, it has emerged. More than 200,000 buildings were washed out by the enormous waves that followed the 9.0 quake on March 11.

There have been reports of cars, tractor-trailers, capsized ships and even whole houses bobbing around in open water. But even more grisly are the predictions of U.S. oceanographer Curtis Ebbesmeyer, who is expecting human feet, still in their shoes, to wash up on the West Coast within three years.

"I'm expecting parts of houses, whole boats and feet in sneakers to wash up," Mr Ebbesmeyer, a Seattle oceanographer who has spent decades tracking flotsam, told MailOnline. Several thousand bodies were washed out to sea following the disaster and while most of the limbs will come apart and break down in the water, feet encased in shoes will float, Mr Ebbesmeyer said. "I'm expecting the unexpected," he added.

Members of the U.S. Navy's 7th fleet, who spotted the extraordinary floating rubbish, say they have never seen anything like it and are warning the debris now poses a threat to shipping traffic.

"It's very challenging to move through these to consider these boats run on propellers and that these fishing nets or other debris can be dangerous to the vessels that are actually trying to do the work," Ensign Vernon Dennis told ABC News. "So getting through some of these obstacles doesn't make much sense if you are going to actually cause more debris by having your own vessel become stuck in one of these waterways."

Scientists say the first bits of debris from Japan are due to reach the West Coast in a year's time after being carried by currents toward Washington, Oregon and California. They will then turn toward Hawaii and back again toward Asia, circulating in what is known as the North Pacific
Gyre, said Mr Ebbesmeyer.

[widgeon13]

Wouldn't feet in sneakers eventually deteriorate in the ocean. I know what he says but I disagree. I think the guy is a little over the top but I could see some of those other things coming on shore in good old California, just another reason to like the east coast.

Couldn't be much worse than the Hudson.

[sammyg2]

I suggest that anything Mr. Ebbesmeyer says should be taken with a grain of salt.
He has been talknig about stuff from China and Japan poluting the west coast of the US for decades.
IMO He's an enviro-wacko extremist and his claims tend to demonstrate that bias.
Untitled Document

[BeyGon]

If it takes a year to get here I think the fish population would have taken care of anything edible, I am not worried about bones and flesh from Japan washing up on the beach here. Cars and trucks, why would they float, buildings, they will break up, we may get debris, we always do.

[scottmandue]

I'm a native So Cal beach boy... used to play on the beach all day as a kid... not uncommon to find Asian debris on the beach.

However the ocean is a pretty effective ecosystem... lots of scavengers living in the sea, seriously doubt any "meat" would survive a float across the Pacific ocean.

[slakjaw]

omg that dude is whack

[Porsche-O-Phile]

So how does the "wet foot, dry foot" immigration policy figure into all this?

[vash]

dibs on the playstation 6.

[pwd72s]

Originally Posted by Porsche-O-Phile

So how does the "wet foot, dry foot" immigration policy figure into all this?

LOL!

Japanese used to use glass (ball shaped) floats for fishing nets. It was considered quite a beach combing prize when I was a youngster. Today?
The tacky Oregon coast "gift shops" all have glass floats for sale. Most likely made in China or Mexico...

[RWebb]

my floats are original Japanese ones, collected right here on the beach

looks like the currents are correct - you can easily verify what the Coast Guard thinks about this by checking with them

[Porsche-O-Phile]

Back in my cargo rat days one of the places I used to lay over during the day was Florence Oregon... Very cool little town with some of the nastiest weather I've ever seen. The beaches were amazing - there were literally piles of driftwood 10 and 20 feet thick washed ashore for miles. Some days I'd go down there and walk around - you could see all kinds of crazy (and gross) stuff - one time I saw a cloud of flies swarming while climbing on one of the piles of driftwood and went to check it out - cow carcass. Yes, a whole cow. Another time I found a half of a small whale (yes, half). Tons of styrofoam, plastic, etc. too. Mostly just lots and lots of trees and busted up branches and things though. It's amazing how much junk gets carried around by the currents.

[RWebb]

they blew up a whale one time - never again

didn't Paul post a link to that?

[ODDJOB UNO]

BLOWING UP WHALES can be FUN and PROFITABLE!

[gtc]

Cool... we could use some more driftwood at my family's beach cabin. Though I doubt we'll see much if any debris coming into puget sound.

[techweenie]

There's an animation somewhere I saw on the web, of the debris field's predicted path. It was created shortly after the initial earthquake. The main body of debris disperses or sinks long before reaching the West Coast and much of it eventually joins the big swirling plastic garbage patch.

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch

Also known as the Pacific Trash Vortex, the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is an area of floating trash estimated to be in excess of 600,000 square miles, or twice the size of the state of Texas, and weighing 3.5 million tons.

Approximately 80% of the debris within the Garbage Patch comes from land, washing down from rivers and storm drains, or being swept off beaches by tides. The remaining 20% is from cargo containers that fall from oceangoing ships and spill their contents. Floating trash, the vast majority of which is plastic, is captured by rotating ocean currents and accumulates within the North Pacific Gyre.

There is a similar phenomenon, the Atlantic Garbage Patch, occurring in the Sargasso Sea between Bermuda and the Azores, in an area known as the North Atlantic Subtropical Gyre.


Read more: The Great Pacific Garbage Patch: Facts on the Garbage in the Sea

[LakeCleElum]

Let me know when my Toyota Diesel 4x4 truck washes up.......

[ODDJOB UNO]

tell me when a 2011 suzuki fuel injected dirty bike drifts in.

[davidrivers]

We got a mess 'o' human feet in sneakers washing ashore here in the Northwest.

Salish Sea human foot discoveries - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I'd say it's possible.