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The floating toxic Fukushima debris approachng USA

Texas-sized toxic ‘island’ of Japan tsunami waste approaching US http://voiceofrussia.com/news/2013_11_05/Texas-sized-toxic-island-of-Japan-tsunami-waste-approaching-US-2200/
 A huge chunk of toxic debris from Japan’s 2011 tsunami is inevitably nearing the US West coast. Currently 1,700 miles away, between Hawaii and California, the “isle of junk” is worth million tons, while another million is still wandering in the Pacific.

In case the floating junkyard, dubbed by Fox News as the “toxic monster,” reunites with the rest of the rubble, its weight might reach five million tons while the area might exceed that of the States. That’s according to the report released last week by the US Department of Commerce’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, as the NOAA was trying to predict exactly the point at which the junkyard would reach land.

The “toxic monster” consists of items swept into the ocean by the tsunami – boats, houses, devices, consumer goods.

The data indicates that the movement of the debris is wildly unpredictable, as experts expect the bulk of the rubbish washing-up at any spot of the West coast of either US or Canada in the next several years.

Some of the debris may have already crossed the Pacific, as reports claim Japanese fishing vessels to have been washed up to Canadian shores as early as winter of 2011. In this case, the level of toxic junk already on the US beaches is probably high.

According to the Japanese Ministry of Environment, the tsunami left around five million tons of rubbish on the coast of Japan, but only 30% floated out into the wider Pacific. The rest, the Ministry claims, sunk to the ocean floor around Japan.

November 7, 2013 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | oceans, USA