The Trash at the Edge of the World

Removing 100,000 lbs of plastic and debris

Albatross chicks on the beach, NOAA

The birds are everywhere. They cover the fields, burrow under your feet, and fill the skies with their calls. Strolling along the broken paths and white sand beaches of Midway Atoll National Wildlife Refuge and Battle of Midway National Monument, it’s hard to believe that you are still in a world inhabited by humans.

Laysan Albatross on Midway Atoll. USFWS

But then you notice an old hanger, several plastic toothbrushes, and hundreds of small unidentifiable pieces of multicolored plastic. At 1,300 miles from the nearest inhabited city, this isn’t simply the work of careless individuals. It’s evidence of a global problem that is threatening coral reef ecosystems, endangered species, and vulnerable sea bird colonies.

Photo: NOAA

What Makes the “The Great Pacific Garbage Patch”?

Every year, hundreds of thousands of pounds of trash wash up of the shores of the Hawaiian islands and remote atolls in the Pacific Ocean. Trash entering the ocean from Asia and the West Coast of America gets caught up in great swirling currents called gyres and collect in areas popularly knows as “garbage patches.” (Spoiler alert, they’re not really patches.)

The Trash Collects on Beaches and Coral Reefs

The Hawaiian Islands and Pacific atolls stretch across the gyre like a comb, collecting trash on their pristine beaches and delicate coral reefs.

The mountains of debris that wash up on these shores and reefs every day pose a lethal hazard for wildlife — including threatened Hawaiian green sea turtles and endangered Hawaiian monk seals. Adult seabirds ingest plastic debris and fishing line and then feed the debris to their chicks. Critically endangered Hawaiian Monk Seals — naturally curious — get entangled and trapped in abandoned netting. And at Midway and Kure Atolls, plastics, fishing gear and other marine debris can be found lining the nests of albatross chicks.