The Great Pacific Garbage Patch has become the stuff of legend. This hotspot of marine waste, created by the spiral currents of the North Pacific Gyre, has been described as a floating trash island the size of Russia.
But when filmmaker Jo Ruxton visited the location, she found clear blue water, and a deep-rooted problem.
Location and currents of the North Pacific Gyre.
Location and currents of the North Pacific Gyre.
"If you were diving, it looked like you had just jumped out of a plane," says Ruxton. "But our nets were coming up completely choked with plastic pieces."
The pieces were small enough to mingle with plankton, the tiny organisms at the base of the food web that support many fish and whale species. Researchers have found 750,000 microplastic pieces per square kilometer in the Garbage Patch, and the marine life is riddled with them.
"This was much more insidious than a huge mountain of trash which could be physically removed," says Ruxton. "You can't remove all the tiny pieces.