Image provided by Oregon State University
March 11, 2011, 2:46 PM, 45 miles east of Tōhoku, Japan. Fifteen miles beneath the waves, a magnitude-9 megathrust earthquake strikes. The Pacific and Eurasian tectonic plates suddenly shift, shaking the surrounding crust for six minutes and creating a tidal wave almost 40 meters high, which races towards the coast of Japan. In the hours that follow, it claims at least 15,894 lives, with thousands more unaccounted for. More than a million buildings are damaged or destroyed, causing nearly $200 billion in damages.
The remnants of those buildings and all sorts of debris liberated by the moving waters have since spread the tsunami’s legacy far beyond the site of impact. As a new study in the journal Science explains, thanks to objects set adrift by the tsunami’s waves, more than two hundred and eighty species have been found on the wrong side of the ocean.
How did hundreds of animals hitch rides across such vast distances? Well, to paraphrase the slogan from America’s Plastics Makers, plastics made it possible. Continue reading “An Unprecedented Number Of Species Have Crossed The Pacific On Tsunami-Liberated Plastic Debris”
