Fouling our own nests

[trapezeartist]

When did you last see a banana skin float by?

Fireball Worlds. 2005. Teignmouth. The start of the first race was delayed by about 2.5 hours and there were 176 boats cruising up and down the line with about 352 banana skins floating by. Any fish that like banana skins were in for a treat when that lot sank!

Wouldn't it be nice if there was a square mile of the sea bed somewhere that didn't have even one sunken can or bottle though?

 

[Boathook]

Weekend away I take home all the recycable stuff. Whilst on holiday I do my best but the harbours don't actually help not having recycling bins. Stuff over the side is tea, coffee and some food scraps, especially if it sinks ............

 

[Magic_Sailor]

eerrm. How do they know that a plastic fishin net will last for over 600 years????

I do know we should chuck things over the side - it's just that I always question this kind of thing.

Magic

 

[puddock]

Came across this in a French tidetables booklet....

Disturbing.

Must you all be so bloomin' negative about everything and self centred?
It is people like you who will put archaeoligists out of a job. No more "Time Team" ! What will Tony Robinson do then? It's not like he can do another season of Blackadder.

 

[David_Jersey]

Not many people know about 'The Great Pacific Garbage Patch' an area of 'Plastic Soup' that streches about 500 nautical miles between USA past Hawaii and almost to Japan. Around 100 million tonnes of our rubbish.

That much ready sorted FREE plastic would be an easy resource to harvest.

I wonder why it hasn't been? Maybe because it only exists on this scale in the minds of the true beleivers?

 

[Fergus]

When I did a transat with ondeck they were chucking the contents of the sanitary towel bin (wrapped up in a plastic bag) over the side - I had a real argument with the skipper about it and she eventually agreed to desist. Back in the day we used to smash bottles with the winch handle, pierce cans etc and chuck but not any more..

I was out with a 4 year old recently who took exception to me throwing cigar butts over the side! Had to explain that they were just made of leaves but she didn't seem impressed..

 

[puddock]

I was out with a 4 year old recently who took exception to me throwing cigar butts over the side! Had to explain that they were just made of leaves but she didn't seem impressed..

On the subject, cigarette filters take years to break down (estimates seem to be around 12 years).

 

[DavenHelen]

Not many people know about 'The Great Pacific Garbage Patch' an area of 'Plastic Soup' that streches about 500 nautical miles between USA past Hawaii and almost to Japan. Around 100 million tonnes of our rubbish. Ok not all has been dumped overboard by YBW users, but for the largest landfill in the world it is not all that well reported.

http://www.independent.co.uk/enviro...at-stretches-from-hawaii-to-japan-778016.html

Not actually a picture of the Pacific Garbage patch though...

 

[KristiferColumbus]

AH it's about rubbish........I very often bring back more than I take out because I cannot stand to see things like plastic & glass bottles littering the lovely untouched places I seek out & try to enjoy.
It is amazing how many people would s**t in their own breakfasts if given half a chance.

 

[ChrisE]

There's really no excuse for throwing things over the side when your next port is less than a couple of days away. On an ocean passage it's a different story. The rules I and many other skippers operate are-

Cans: puncture and sink
Bottles: fill and sink
Food waste: overside
Paper: ditto
Plastics: wash & store.

I understand that in Ireland you can't take your waste to a convenient bin ashore. I wonder how much additional dumping at sea that causes.

I agree with you and would add "and burn the plastic when you get to the far bank". Not very pc, I know. I'm not sure everybody knows that if you don't burn the plastic it ends up in a tip that ends up in the sea. Or at least it did on most of the Atlantic and Caribbean islands we have visited.

 

[DaveS]

Glass underwater

Depending on how you look at the picture, the survival time for glass is shown as either 600 years or indeterminate. I had an experience a few years ago which makes me rather doubt this.

In the early 90s I took part in a clean up of a bit of the Forth and Clyde Canal in Glasgow, at Lock 27 beside the newish pub of the same name, built there about 15 years previously. With the canal de-watered, hundreds of beer glasses were revealed on the bottom within chucking distance of the pub garden. These we removed. The interesting point was that while some glasses were almost "as new", others were noticeably lighter and thinner, and some of these were so weak that they broke under the gentlest handling. If the thinnest (and presumably oldest) ones had been in the water for less than 20 years then I reckon that about 50 years would have been enough to make them disappear entirely.

Now that was of course fresh water not salt, and there is every chance of contamination of the canal water with all sorts of industrial effluent, but the F&C has an ample water supply and any effluent would be massively diluted. So coming back to the original point, I rather wonder if the quoted figure for glass survival time is exaggerated.

 

[AntarcticPilot]

Depending on how you look at the picture, the survival time for glass is shown as either 600 years or indeterminate. I had an experience a few years ago which makes me rather doubt this.

In the early 90s I took part in a clean up of a bit of the Forth and Clyde Canal in Glasgow, at Lock 27 beside the newish pub of the same name, built there about 15 years previously. With the canal de-watered, hundreds of beer glasses were revealed on the bottom within chucking distance of the pub garden. These we removed. The interesting point was that while some glasses were almost "as new", others were noticeably lighter and thinner, and some of these were so weak that they broke under the gentlest handling. If the thinnest (and presumably oldest) ones had been in the water for less than 20 years then I reckon that about 50 years would have been enough to make them disappear entirely.

Now that was of course fresh water not salt, and there is every chance of contamination of the canal water with all sorts of industrial effluent, but the F&C has an ample water supply and any effluent would be massively diluted. So coming back to the original point, I rather wonder if the quoted figure for glass survival time is exaggerated.

It almost certainly depends on the composition of the glass. Beer glasses are not expected to have a long life, so I guess they are made of cheap low melting point soda glass, which might well leach out in water, and which might re-crystallize. Better quality glass will probably last longer - borosilicate glass (Pyrex) or silica glass will probably last indefinitely.

 

[MarkJohnson12345]

A blink of an eye

If an aluminium can lasts 200 years in the ocean, why can't they make outdrives/outboards out of the same material.

Reading the anguished cries of the Moboers they seem to have a life of only a few years.

Sitting in glorious sunshine off Dover with 1.8 knots of wind across the deck.

200 years might seem a long time to us, but its just a moment for the planet.

Tins I have no problem with, and ex food. But things that float and get washed up are a nono for dumping at sea.

JMHO

 

[Boreades]

the things that we dont yet have the technology to recycle can be buried with no great problem because they all will go in a reasonable time scale ...

Pweh! That's a relief! I'm glad to hear that, and I expect the NDA will be relieved as well. Can we count you in for a deep-bore disposal site in your back garden?

 

[Boreades]

Just to break a habit and treat the OP with respect (sorry Bilbo), it's become such a serious problem in Mayflower Marina, that they are going to make up a kind of trawler with a workboat. It's not just the eyesore, there's so much floating **** it can damage props, get jammed in water intakes, etc. I've volunteered my children as crew (it might encourage them to keep their bedrooms tidier)

 

[sea]

Just to break a habit and treat the OP with respect (sorry Bilbo), it's become such a serious problem in Mayflower Marina, that they are going to make up a kind of trawler with a workboat. It's not just the eyesore, there's so much floating **** it can damage props, get jammed in water intakes, etc. I've volunteered my children as crew (it might encourage them to keep their bedrooms tidier)

Great news, 1 week in mayflower caused a huge scum line around the waterline of our boat. + we awoke to a knocking on the hull, which turned out to be 1/2 a sheet of 8x4 marine ply caught between the hull and the pontoon. About time!

 

[Bajansailor]

I had a most enjoyable holiday on the Chesapeake in July helping out a pal with a boat in Baltimore - however I was amazed at the quantity of trash in the harbour despite the best efforts by the full time hard working fleet of Trash Cats to try and keep it under control - here is a link to them http://www.trashskimmer.com/skimmerbalto.htm
And the rubbish does not come from people on boats, but from the city's drains......

Changing tack, ChrisE mentioned above the problems of garbage in landfills on little Caribbean islands - if you are sailing across the Atlantic, or around the Caribbean, PLEASE do deep six your cans, non-returnable bottles and organic waste in deep water.
I know that one thinks one should save everything and dispose of it ashore - but in many islands of the Caribbean, especially the Grenadines, the shore facilities cannot cope with local supply, let alone that generated by hundreds of visiting boats.
And very often the landfill ends up in the harbour anyway, if there have been heavy rains.....

 

[Genoa]

2 completely seperate points ...

20 years ago, I remember taking my rubbish ashore, then watching it being collected, along with many other bins, emptied onto a waiting barge and taken off to meet its fate somewhere south of the IoW ...

Today we see so much more floating around, and the increase of mobos flying around has increased at a statisitically relevant, similar rate. Coincidence? (?) (b)