The Great Pacific Garbage
Patch is a collection of marine debris in the North Pacific
Ocean. Marine debris is litter that ends up in oceans, seas, and other large
bodies of water.
The
Great Pacific Garbage Patch, also known as the Pacific trash vortex, spans
waters from the West Coast of North America to
Japan. The patch is actually comprised of the Western Garbage Patch,
located near Japan, and the Eastern Garbage Patch, located between the U.S.
states of Hawaii and California.
It
is thought that, like other areas of concentrated marine debris in the world's
oceans, the Great Pacific garbage patch formed gradually as a result of ocean
or marine pollution gathered by oceanic currents. The
garbage patch occupies a large and relatively stationary region of the North
Pacific Ocean bound by the North Pacific Gyre. The gyre's rotational pattern draws in
waste material from across the North Pacific Ocean, including coastal waters
off North America and Japan. As material is captured in the currents,
wind-driven surface currents gradually move floating debris toward the center,
trapping it in the region.
The size of the patch is unknown, because
large items readily visible from a boat deck are uncommon. Estimates of size
range from 700,000
square kilometres to more than 15,000,000 square
kilometres or in some media reports, up to "twice the size of the
continental United States". It
is too large for
scientists to trawl the entire surface. In addition, not all of the trash
floats on the surface.
Voici sa définition, localisation et sa taille. J'espère que ça t'aidera ^^
