Ripley's Believe It or Not by Ripley’s Believe It or Not! for July 25, 2015
July 24, 2015
July 26, 2015
Transcript:
The great Pacific garbage patch covers 8.1% of the Pacific Ocean- twice the size of the continental US! Alfonso XIII of Spain was born on May 17, 1886. He became king the same day, serving until 1931! In Natchez, Mississippi, Ruphus E. Case was buried in his rocking chair, facing his home state of Louisiana.
More From Ripley's Believe It or Not
While I do not like this “garbage patch” in the Pacific, and want to see it remedied, the Ripley article is taking the most exaggerated estimates. Even Greenpeace, which I consider to be somewhat reliable on this, says the patch is the size of Texas, not “twice the size of the continental United States.”
The garbage patch is not visible from space, nor from satellite observations, so it has been difficult to measure or track. I would like to see an international project to recover as much of this plastic as possible. If you don’t feel badly for birds, sea turtles, and other ocean wildlife, do it for yourselves, because what goes into the ocean eventually ends up back on our tables.