• Project:
• Original Title:
• Translated Title: New Track
• Translator: Johanne Hesseldahl
• Language: English
• Subtitles: 267
• Words: 2889
• Comment:
• Client:
• Creation Date: 16. Nov. 2011
• Revision:
• Revision Date: 16. Nov. 2011
• Media File: No Media
• Format: 25 PAL
• Offset: 00:00:00:00
Every reporter changes the story.
Just like every scientist changes what he is observing,
every reporter is changing that story.
What are we doing, Joe?
We are ready to put a plastic ketcher in the water to troll.
Troll for plastic.
What in the hell is that?
There's a misconception that the worst kind of spill is those gooey oily mess,
but it is really these nice little bits of your plastic bottles
that is gonna be around forever, basically.
So we are just on the outskirts of the Gyre right now. Haven't really even
gotten into the thick of things, and already in the last hour we have seen
more fucking trash flow by than we have in the entire voyage until now.
We're nowhere near land, we're nowhere near any other fucking ships and it's just
flotsam city out here.
All fucking plastic too.
All gross sunbaked plastic.
It's absurd.
Just this one chemical, Bisphenol A, that is used to make these hard clear
plastic called polycarbonate, is produced at over seven billion pounds
a year and it's a nonrecyclable plastic.
What's happening to it?
It's being thrown away into the environment.
The evidence from Europe, Asia, the United States, is that every person
examined has these chemicals in their bodies.
There is actually a study in Japan, where women with elevated levels of
Bisphenol A, were the women who were repeatedly miscarrying,
never able to have a successful pregnancy.
When you go out into the ocean and you see that the ocean is full of these
plastic products, where in the world is there not exposure to them?
Hi, I'm Thomas Morton. We're here in Long Beach, California on our way to
meet Charles Moore, who is the captain of the Oceanographics Research Vessel, Alguita.
For a number of years, we have been reading these articles about this huge
section of the ocean that is essentially a floating landfill.
Ten years ago on a sailing trip back from Australia, Captain Moore took a
detour into a section of the North Pacific called the North Pacific Gyre,
which is kind of a swirling vortex of currents.
That area has historically acted as a collecting point for all the debris,
and sometimes referred to as the eastern garbage patch.
Now, kind of with the advent of plastics, it's just become one large
continuous dump.
When Captain Moore found it, it was just plastic bags and bottles
and consumer products as far as the eye can see.
Some places have estimated as the size of Texas.
There is a lot of what sounds like hyperbole and some people have written
it off totally as just a urban myth.
We're gonna go out with Captain Moore on his boat to survey the damage out there.
I've never been on a boat and I've been kind of boning up on my knots
and swimming lessons and all.
It's a three week trip. We have to get out there a week of taking samples
and hanging out with all the trash and a week to get back.
We are going to act as crew.
It's Jake, our camera guy and Meredith, the producer.
We are one half of the crew of ORV Alguita on our way to garbage island.
Captain Moore!
-Hi, I'm Thomas.
-Nice to meet you, Thomas.
-Good to meet you.
-Good to have you. Come on onboard.
We've got some people for you to meet here.
Alright! Welcome!
Come on in, welcome onboard.
We do have a freezer on this side.
We can put a couple gallons of ice cream in there.
Ice cream seem to be a high priority for you.
Well, it's like, that's a treat, you know, because it's a dry boat.
I usually give her one day in the jar because it's so calm, and we have been
working so hard for so long, where we just put out the sea anchor and stop
and if you wanna get pissed, go ahead.
But mostly when you are on watch and we are working, it's a dry boat.
That's just the way it is.
I know, that you don't have much experience, but do you know whether
or not you get seasick?
I have in the past, but eh...
Okay, so you are gonna probably want the patch. At least to get started.
I'm about to get my scopolamine patch to help to keep down the seasickness, hopefully.