Solar Impulse Pilot: ‘I Flew Over Plastic Waste As Big As a Continent’

[Hellravager]

Fuck politics this needs to be discussed....
http://ecowatch.com/2016/04/25/solar...se-boyan-slat/

As the Solar Impulse 2 made its historic 62-hour flight from Hawaii to California without fuel, pilot Bertrand Piccard personally saw the horrific amount of plastic in our oceans.
solarimpulse
The solar airplane as it approaches the California. Photo credit: Solar Impulse

While flying above the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, Piccard sent out a tweet to Boyan Slat, the 21-year-old founder and CEO of The Ocean Cleanup.

“I flew over plastic waste as big as a continent,” Piccard wrote. “We must continue to support projects like @BoyanSlat Ocean Cleanup,” referring to Slat’s ambitious project of ridding the world’s oceans of plastic trash.

The Ocean Cleanup describes itself as the “world’s first feasible concept to clean the oceans of plastic” and has garnered widespread public admiration and support especially for Slat, a former aerospace engineering student who proposed the concept when he was only 17.

Piccard and Slat also spoke on Friday as the solar-powered plane made its risky journey.

It’s no surprise that the pilot and the young inventor linked up—both are using innovative technology to promote the greater good of the planet.

Piccard and the Solar Impulse team plan to fly around the world using only the power of the sun to promote clean transportation and other environmental causes.

“We have demonstrated it is feasible to fly many days, many nights, that the technology works,” fellow pilot Andre Borschberg told the Associated Press.

“I think innovation and pioneering must continue,” Piccard added. “It must continue for better quality of life, for clean technologies, for renewable energy. This is where the pioneers can really express themselves and be successful.”

Slat has spoken before about the necessity to protect our oceans.

“The oceans are the most important life—support systems of our planet,” he said in 2014. “It regulates the climate, it produces oxygen. The vast majority of biodiversity can be found in the ocean.”

The Ocean Cleanup involves a massive static platform and V-shapped booms that passively corrals plastics with wind and ocean currents. If all goes to plan, the project will officially launch in 2020 and be the longest floating structure ever deployed in the ocean.

Similarly, both parties have experienced hiccups along the way. Before arriving in California, the plane, the Solar Impulse 2, had been grounded in Hawaii for nine months as it underwent repairs after its record-breaking five-day trip from Japan to Hawaii in July.

As for Ocean Cleanup project, despite a 530-page feasibility study, some critics and scientists have written off Slat’s idea on mechanical design and ecological impacts. Dr. Marcus Eriksen, the co-founder of 5 Gyres, offered a number of constructive suggestions for the project.

Still, it’s very clear that the environment needs whatever help it can get, from curbing our reliance on dirty energy to putting a stop to plastic waste. The world’s oceans and marine life are suffering from a devastating plastic crisis, with 8 million metric tons of plastic waste dumped into our oceans every year. Plastic pollution is only getting worse as consumer use of plastic and plastic-intensive goods intensifies in emerging countries.

Not only that, an alarming new study by the University of Delaware physical oceanographer Tobias Kukulka reported that there might be much more plastic than what’s estimated.

“My research has shown that ocean turbulence actually mixes plastics and other pollutants down into the water column despite their buoyancy,” Kukulka said, according to UD Daily. “This means that surface measurements could be wildly off and the concentration of plastic in the marine environment may be significantly higher than we thought.”

[Gheld]

Such hyperbole! It's only the size of mexico! jj.

Yeah it's pretty fucked up what we've done to the ocean :\

[Azadina]

Captain Picard?

[Gorehowl]

i think they meant to say that california is a garbage patch and we need to clean it up asap.

[Lothaeryn]

i think they meant to say that california is a garbage patch and we need to clean it up asap.

I loled

Either way its still a shame that there is such a huge clump sitting out there in the ocean, curious how it formed like that though. currents drawing the debris together over time i suppose?

[truckboattruck]

fish are welcome to start paying their taxes so we can provide them with such a service

[Forogil]

While flying above the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, Piccard sent out a tweet to Boyan Slat, the 21-year-old founder and CEO of The Ocean Cleanup.

“I flew over plastic waste as big as a continent,” Piccard wrote. “We must continue to support projects like @BoyanSlat Ocean Cleanup,” referring to Slat’s ambitious project of ridding the world’s oceans of plastic trash.

Seems like pure exaggeration - it is smaller than the continents and as far as I understand it isn't a plastic waste dump that you would identify easily - just an area with some plastic waste. Similarly as if you go into a forest and see some plastic in almost every football field-sized patch you are annoyed, but it doesn't make the forest a plastic waste dump.

https://skeptoid.com/episodes/4132
In another episode he explains how the exaggeration leads to problem: like ideas to launch boats fuelled by the burning the plastic.

The obvious question is - why didn't Piccard just take a photo of it to demonstrate the problem? Or basically why not trust your eyes?

The picture tweeted shows a barrier in place collecting the plastic debris - that is Ocean Cleanup collecting plastic, http://ecowatch.com/2015/04/08/boyan...eanup-plastic/ , not the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.

[Flutterguy]

Size of a continent you say? And no pics? Couldn't even pull out his cell phone and snap a shot of this continent sized plastic mass?

[p291u]

Size of a continent you say? And no pics? Couldn't even pull out his cell phone and snap a shot of this continent sized plastic mass?

That's because the image of floating islands of plastic/garbage is a load of shit. The density of these patches are so low you could be sailing right through them and not even know.

[Graeham]

It's likely an exaggeration but the state of the world's oceans and the amount of pollution and waste being pumped into them is a valid and genuine concern. Unfortunately it doesn't seem like a whole lot is going to be done about it and as per usual we'll probably see peer pressure to donate to dubious charities or for taxes to be raised when in reality the people ultimately responsible for the mess will go without punishment.

[Deleted]

I once flew over an ocean as big as a continent.

[Hooked]

Yet no one bats an eye lash when fukishima dumps lord knows how much radiation into the ocean. As long as theres no dirty oil on the birdies it doesn't matter I guess.

[Noradin]

If it is the size of a continent then North America must vanish any minute now, hollowed out as it must be :P

[Deleted]

Isn't this common knowledge

[Puri]

It is known.

[Khaza-R]

How did he see said garbage patch when its mostly microscopic in nature?

Large pieces of plastic aren't the real danger in the ocean. Its that plastics break down to be small particles. Then they are ingested by fish and accumulate in the food supply. Which is most dangerous for the larger species of fish and mammals (humans included) who can potentially ingest large quantities of these plastics.

[Nathreim]

This should be our biggest concern not global warming. Dumping in our rivers and oceans can have a disastrous effect in our lifetime.

[Netherspark]

This isn't even the largest one. There are even bigger garbage patches in the middle of the Pacific, and another (smaller) one in the Atlantic.

How did he see said garbage patch when its mostly microscopic in nature?

Large pieces of plastic aren't the real danger in the ocean. Its that plastics break down to be small particles. Then they are ingested by fish and accumulate in the food supply. Which is most dangerous for the larger species of fish and mammals (humans included) who can potentially ingest large quantities of these plastics.

Where do you think those particles come from?

[Blobfish]

This isn't even the largest one. There are even bigger garbage patches in the middle of the Pacific, and another (smaller) one in the Atlantic.



Where do you think those particles come from?

Japanese Tsunami in 2011 caused by a Magnitude 9.0 undersea Earthquake
washed a whole lot of crap into the Pacific Ocean

[Ghostpanther]

This should be our biggest concern not global warming. Dumping in our rivers and oceans can have a disastrous effect in our lifetime.

This. But it does not carry the political clout that Global Warming has and they have not offered any real solution. There are a lot of people who do not give a shit about polluting our environment. I see this all the time with all the trash that has been thrown out of passing cars going down the road in front of my house.:P