Calling all divers and snorklers for fact check...

[EmdeReef]

I am completely perplexed by this (and similar) studies. I have been diving over many miles of coral reefs in the Caribbean and Hawaii. I've never seen a single piece of plastic on the reefs, on the bottom or in the water. So I am struggling, without success, to reconcile my first hand observations with those of this study.

The study does point out that 4 countries (Australia, Thailand, Indonesia and Myanmar) are "heavily contaminated", but that rings hollow too. The vast majority of the Australian coast is essentially uninhabited. The areas I've dove are pretty populated. How can there be no observable plastic in all of the places I've been and "heavy contamination" in Australia, which is much less inhabited than some of the areas I dove.

I'd love to get first hand accounts from the divers and snorkelers among us. How big a problem is this???

Great topic!

Trash causes both physical destruction, bottles, tires etc getting lodged all over but even more insidious is the pollution from trash. A few years back researches in Australia discovered that corals eat micro-plastic which is indigestible. And yes trash in the ocean is everywhere, including the slopes of the Mariana Trench.

Trash moves on the ocean floor and so a single location or a reef, depending on the currents, storms, proximity to coasts or the great Atlantic / Pacific garbage patches can appear different at different times.
On a recent dive around Curaçao I was surprised how many golf balls, glass and plastic bottles and plastic bags I saw on and around a reef that just two years ago I remembered as pristine.

There’s a pretty good book called Flotsametrics which goes in some detail about these issues.

 

[Paul B]

Boy between diving and Reefing you are my god. I bend a knee to thee. Seriously aim would never dive LI sound. To cold and too much garbage

The cold and garbage make it interesting. I find all sorts of stuff. You won't find anything in the tropics.

Recess, I have been diving since tanks were made of wood!
I have always had a boat and my own gear and live near the Sound.

 

[Kamden Uelton]

Theres a small amount of plastic in the IRL (Indian River Lagoon), Nothing to phone home about though.

 

[User1]

So... what you're saying is that you need a bigger lift bag? ;-)

Lol - probably. Sadly it isn't the only time I found one. We came across one diving the Rubicon wall in Lake Tahoe. I don't remember the engine manufacture but this one stuck out more like a sore thumb compared to the one in saltwater. Lake Tahoe you can see for miles and this was heading to the actual wall under water. So it is a slow gradual depth increase to deeper water almost like a ocean open water deep dive. Then you see this large object with nothing around it at all. Nothing. Just the engine

In the ocean at least it incrusts with stuff and had life around it. Still not the proper artificial reef.

@EmdeReef - no bodies here. I've read some articles of people coming up on them though. That would be a bit freaky for me probably. Sorry if you had to come across one. I can only imagine.

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley]

True, but that's after saying it is "heavily contaminated". I am one of those people who trusts their senses. That's why I'm really curious to know whet the first hand observations are of people in our hobby. I think there are a lot of divers among us, and we are probably very tuned in to solution and the health of the reefs we dive on.

FWIW, the scientific paper itself doesn't use the words "heavily" or "contaminated" anywhere in the paper. It is the news report on the paper that put that opinion comment in.

The paper does say:

"The number of plastic items observed on each reef varied markedly among countries, from maxima in Indonesia [25.6 items per 100 ± 12.2 m2 (here and elsewhere, the number after the ± symbol denotes SEM)] to minima in Australia (0.4 items per 100 ± 0.3 m2 )""

Which means that to find one piece of trash in Australia, one has to examine 250 m2 (2691 sq ft) of reef.

 

[jgvergo]

FWIW, the scientific paper itself doesn't use the words "heavily" or "contaminated" anywhere in the paper. It is the news report on the paper that put that opinion comment in.

The paper does say:

"The number of plastic items observed on each reef varied markedly among countries, from maxima in Indonesia [25.6 items per 100 ± 12.2 m2 (here and elsewhere, the number after the ± symbol denotes SEM)] to minima in Australia (0.4 items per 100 ± 0.3 m2 )""

Which means that to find one piece of trash in Australia, one has to examine 250 m2 (2691 sq ft) of reef.

Here is how those data are translated by various news outlets (I Googled "reef coral plastic")

:

 

[Tautog]

If you didn’t know..........but the guys that haul garbage on boats and barges have the right to dump their cargo, even just outside the inlet, if the Captain decides it’s too rough. As a fisherman, I have driven through acres of RedBag, medical waste, garbage floating only 3 miles off the beach. In the Pacific, there’s miles of plastic floating islands.
Thank God for Saltwater!

 

[EmdeReef]

Here is how those data are translated by various news outlets (I Googled "reef coral plastic")

:

Could you please explain what are you ultimately trying to get at? News outlets are sensational? or this and other studies are wrong?
This isn't the only study and also physical presence of trash on a reef is not the only way it impacts reefs. FWIW I've never witnessed one of the bleaching events of 2015/16 but that doesn't mean they didn't happen.

 

[jgvergo]

Could you please explain what are you ultimately trying to get at? News outlets are sensational? or this and other studies are wrong?
This isn't the only study and also physical presence of trash on a reef is not the only way it impacts reefs. FWIW I've never witnessed one of the bleaching events of 2015/16 but that doesn't mean they didn't happen.

My primary goal was to get some firsthand accounts because what I have personally witnessed is not consistent with what I'm reading. I am a scientist and (by definition) skeptical.

The responses to my original post have taught me a couple of things: 1) My personal experiences are not representative of the experiences of this community. People have seen, firsthand, a fair amount of garbage on their dives. One reason for this is probably due to where people dive. I grew up on Long Island, so I'm not surprised that the Sound has a lot of garbage. I also accept as fact that there is observable garbage off the California coast. My diving has been limited to the Caribbean and Hawaii. 2) There seems to be little question that news outlets sensationalized the results of this particular study. The headlines I showed speak for themselves. They connote a much more serious problem than we are likely facing. I'm not saying the problem is non-existent, but it's not as bleak as these reports make it out to be.

Regarding bleaching events, I read some of the papers on the topic and there is no question in my mind that news outlets sensationalized that as well. There is no question that bleaching events are real but the way they were reported was essentially dishonest. For example, it was reported that 1/3 of the Great Barrier Reef was bleached when in fact bleaching was observed on 1/3 of the reefs. The difference between those statements is enormous.

 

[User1]

@jgvergo - since I'm one diver representing Northern California I can't speak for all of California I can only tell you what I see when I dive around the Monterey area and Lake Tahoe. I've also dived in Hawaii, various locations in the Caribbean, and Okinawa Japan. If people are present, navigational thoroughfare, boating of any types, etc - people - then garbage will be found when diving. People litter and not everyone is consciousness of the surrounding environment. That is just my observation and personal opinion.

The barge, trash, cruise liner, landfill dumping is another story all together. I was just answering what I've personally seen, and do when I come upon it. I didn't include some of the river clean up volunteer diving I've done which is 10x worse. Again, due to the people river rafting down the American River the trash one picks up is utterly amazing. In that case I have pulled up multiple trash bags of crap ranging from guns, safes, cash registers, thongs, bras, and boat ores to name a few

 

[EmdeReef]

My primary goal was to get some firsthand accounts because what I have personally witnessed is not consistent with what I'm reading. I am a scientist and (by definition) skeptical.

The responses to my original post have taught me a couple of things: 1) My personal experiences are not representative of the experiences of this community. People have seen, firsthand, a fair amount of garbage on their dives. One reason for this is probably due to where people dive. I grew up on Long Island, so I'm not surprised that the Sound has a lot of garbage. I also accept as fact that there is observable garbage off the California coast. My diving has been limited to the Caribbean and Hawaii. 2) There seems to be little question that news outlets sensationalized the results of this particular study. The headlines I showed speak for themselves. They connote a much more serious problem than we are likely facing. I'm not saying the problem is non-existent, but it's not as bleak as these reports make it out to be.

Regarding bleaching events, I read some of the papers on the topic and there is no question in my mind that news outlets sensationalized that as well. There is no question that bleaching events are real but the way they were reported was essentially dishonest. For example, it was reported that 1/3 of the Great Barrier Reef was bleached when in fact bleaching was observed on 1/3 of the reefs. The difference between those statements is enormous.

Thanks, I understand better. I fully agree that science reporting in the media these days is beyond horrible and it's always good to be skeptical.

Not sure where the 1/3rd came from, the most recent study I've read about points that only ~9% of the GBR reef did not get impacted by bleaching at all, but that doesn't mean the rest was entirely bleached. I'm not sure if I can post the PDF due to copyrights but the article is available here - https://www.nature.com/articles/nature21707 and the full study was published in Science too.

I believe this is what you maybe referring to:

 

[EmdeReef]

Lol - probably. Sadly it isn't the only time I found one. We came across one diving the Rubicon wall in Lake Tahoe. I don't remember the engine manufacture but this one stuck out more like a sore thumb compared to the one in saltwater. Lake Tahoe you can see for miles and this was heading to the actual wall under water. So it is a slow gradual depth increase to deeper water almost like a ocean open water deep dive. Then you see this large object with nothing around it at all. Nothing. Just the engine

In the ocean at least it incrusts with stuff and had life around it. Still not the proper artificial reef.

@EmdeReef - no bodies here. I've read some articles of people coming up on them though. That would be a bit freaky for me probably. Sorry if you had to come across one. I can only imagine.

That was just a bad NY joke East River, the Sound, and the Bays around NYC/NJ were somewhat infamous mob body dumping grounds back in the day...

 

[airmotive]

We spent a week diving in Vietnam. (Danang and Nha Trang).
The waters where we dove around Danang were pristine. Granted, this was a rather posh resort (InterContinental) and a lot of effort went into perfection of everything. However, Nha Trang is sort of the Cancuun for Russians and Chinese. Lots of trash on the beach, mainly from the fleet of fishing boats that anchor off shore (things like light bulbs, empty oil bottles, etc). That said, all the reefs we dove there were brilliant.
They are struggling with crown-of-thorns starfish, but no plastic plague.
I've never seen much trash at all on reefs I've dove in Puerto Rico, Belize, South Africa, Guam, Grand Cayman or Hawaii. I'm sure there are trashed reefs. But in my rather widely distributed sample, I've not experienced one.

 

[[Cameron]]

I'm in SE Florida, and I dive a ton. I see multiple pieces of garbage every dive. Anything from fishing line to Styrofoam to grocery bags.

Same. I do see a lot of aluminum and glass bottles as well. Not sure of the impact of the "garbage" though. Seems most life grows right over it given long enough. More likely issues are warming waters and biological waste being dumped or running off.

 

[Chris Baker]

I pulled quite a bit of plastic out of the water snorkeling the Belize Barrier Reef by Caye Caulker a month ago. A truly immense amount of plastic pollution was trapped in the mangrove roots and washed up on the shore of the cayes less than a quarter mile away. I can't believe that's not impacting the health of the reef particularly as it breaks down into smaller pieces. My guess would be that plastic pollution is more likely to accumulate in shallow water reefs and nearby lagoons which are also an important part of the reef ecosystem. That area of the Belize Barrier Reef also had other challenging ecological problems with decades of overfishing for lobster, grouper, and snapper as well as bleaching events the summer before so it's not as if the plastic is the only challenge but it is one.

On another note, I work for a marine education nonprofit and have found first hand that, at least in my area of eastern Connecticut, children are extremely receptive to learning about, preventing, and cleaning marine debris when they are educated about it. That lesson is always a huge hit and is the biggest thing kids remember a year or two down the road. It gives me hope if we can continue education and mitigate the damage to the ocean that is already being done.

 

[Midrats]

I'm going straight to hell.

 

[Paul B]

That was just a bad NY joke East River, the Sound, and the Bays around NYC/NJ were somewhat infamous mob body dumping grounds back in the day...

Actually my dive partner found a 45 with a silencer on it off New Jersey.

As for trash or garbage, that in itself won't hurt a reef or cause any bleaching. Of course if a piece of trash is laying on a coral, that piece may die, but the coral will just grow on it. Here in New York I have been diving for lobsters since about 1974 and the main place we find lobsters in in tires. Almost every tire has a lobster. On bare areas with no trash or rocks, there is nothing.
Also under the many bridges we have here the bottom is filled with construction debris. Again, loaded with lobsters.
Some "trash" in some places is advantage to sea life. Not chemicals of course. But here in NY at least which is not reserved as a divers paradise by any stretch of the imagination I have been asking for areas to be put aside to fill with tires as a test. The only thing that limits lobsters here is lack of living places. The Sound is almost all rocks but only one lobster will live in a hole and it will chase any other lobsters away so we need more holes.
Also fish do not spawn on open sand or mud, They lay eggs in tires, bottles and cans.
I am only talking about northern waters like NY, not the Caribbean, Tahiti or Hawaii as those places depend on tourists, but even in those places they could place cinder blocks or pipes in areas that divers do not go just to provide breeding places for fish.

The fish in my tank spawn in the bottles more than in the rocks.



My copperband disagrees.

 

[chefjpaul]

from personal experience in samoa, fiji, tonga, and bali. Trash was not see on the reefs that i dived on off shore (ie atleast 100 yards from shore) Trash was found in lagoon areas close to shore, especially in seagrass beds i would find glass bottles, plastics and an occasional tire. I think one reason you dont see much trash on the offshore reefs is that storms push it toward the beach and you find most of it will settle in lagoons and other low flow areas

This^^

I've dove, GBR, Belize, Caribbean, Pacific, etc.

Haven't seen much on reef, just what washes up towards shore.

They are called barriers for a reason, protect the open water and land.

It is still very disturbing how much is out there though.

 

[XNavyDiver]

Well, like the name suggests, I've done my fair share of diving in my day. Unfortunately, the vast majority of it has been of the working/salvage type, in deep cold waters and zero visibility. If we were on dive site, we were there for a reason... to pick crap off the ocean floor and bring it back to the surface. I've done a handful of recreational dives, but none in the areas the OP sited. Mainly in the Caribbean and Red Sea. So I guess I can't be of help in this discussion.

 

[alton]

Very informative thanks everyone for posting. It does seem like unless its bad news CNN and other will not post it, I guess they figure for all the great things going on in the world we rely on R2R!