Even the deep ocean does not escape plastic pollution. In a study published on September 16 in the scientific journal Plos One, a team of researchers says they found debris of plastic objects up to the underwater canyon « Mar del Plata », southwest of the Atlantic, 250 kilometers from the coast of Argentina.
Plastic bags, food packaging, fishing gear, a boot… During 10 of the 17 dives made between 800 and 3,900 meters deep using a remote-controlled submersible, scientists identified no less than 29 objects of human origin, made of plastic and rubber. They were probably thrown from the ground, and channeled to this canyon because of the geography of the place.
Some debris was buried in the sediments, others stuck in rocks. Others, still, drifting. Animals, including crustaceans, have been observed interacting with this waste. Starfish and corals were found attached to them, especially to plastic packaging and fishing nets.
A plastic bag found nearly 11,000 m below the surface
However, it should not be deduced that our plastic waste provides refuges for marine life: « Marine waste remains a chronic anthropogenic disturbance that can alter the structure of habitats, modify ecological interactions and introduce potentially polluting materials into ecosystems that have largely evolved in their absence, » they write. Marine animals can die by entangled in the debris of fishing nets or by suffocating when ingesting pieces of plastic.
It is estimated that between 5 and 13 million tons of plastic waste run aground in the oceans each year (or 1% to 4% of world production). In April, a plastic bag had already been found in the Mariana Trenk, the deepest in the world, nearly 11,000 meters below the surface.
