The vast Pacific Ocean, spanning from the coasts of Japan to the shores of California, harbors a beast, a gyre of toxic plastics and trash that plagues a section of water larger than continental North America. It is known as The Great Pacific Garbage Patch.

The patch of debris is formed by the North Pacific Gyre, one of the largest ecosystems in the world. The gyre is a whirlpool of four prevalent currents that flow clockwise into a massive blockage of garbage in the middle of the Pacific.

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch, also known as the Pacific Trash Vortex, afflicts hundreds of species, including our own.  Many seabirds eat fish living near the great mass of garbage and, unknowingly, ingest the toxic chemicals and debris that the fish themselves are poisoned with. The same poisoned fish are then caught in nets and fed to people at restaurants. The seafood supply from that region is, therefore, contaminated.

Principal investigator Andrea Neal of Project Kaisei, a project designed to help clean up the Pacific Trash Vortex, reveals her personal beliefs of the garbage patch in her mission statement of the project.  Kaisei says the patch is “the new man-made epidemic. It’s that serious.”