A Remote Paradise Island Is Now a Plastic Junkyard

[misskit]

Henderson Island is isolated and uninhabited—but its beaches are still covered in garbage.


Henderson Island is about the most remote place you can visit without leaving the planet. It sits squarely in the middle of the South Pacific, 3,500 miles from New Zealand in one direction and another 3,500 miles from South America in the other. To get there, Jennifer Lavers had to fly from Tasmania to Tahiti, catch a small, once-a-week plane to the Gambier Islands, join a freight ship that had already sailed for 10 days from New Zealand, and ask it to change course for Henderson. No ship travels there unless you specifically ask it to.

And yet, somehow, Google Street View has been there. Lavers took virtual strolls along two of the island’s beaches before she made her epic journey. That’s when she realized just how much plastic there is.

You can see for yourself. Pull Henderson Island up on Google Maps and drag the yellow avatar to the bottom of the eastern beach. Now, start walking. It starts unobtrusively: a bottle here, a bit of tubing there. But soon, the scraps pile up until the sand is carpeted in multi-colored junk.



more here https://www.theatlantic.com/science/...nkyard/526743/

[VocalNeal]

Just the recommendation for a beach hideaway?

[Thedogsbollix]

When the monsoon hits and the winds are blowing onshore most beaches collect flotsam, some more than others.

The islands in the Gulf of Thailand excel at it.

If the beaches on Samui were not cleaned up it would be one massive rubbish tip in the monsoon season.

[HermantheGerman]

Can you imagine what the bottom of the oceans must look like?

[Dragonfly]

well the positive thing is that it will provide future archeologists a treasure of evidence about our lifestyle

[chassamui]

I once took part in breeding bird surveys on one of the uninhabited Scilly Isles. Very similar detritus.
The surprise was that birds continued to breed there. They clearly lack human aesthetic DNA.

[justme2017]

Yeah the garbage problem in the last decade is pretty sad.

[thaimeme]

We are a sad lot.

[Pragmatic]

It isn't as bad as Dunkirk was.

[wasabi]

It's a long way to travel to see a paradise beach.