Latest news with #WhaleontheWharf
Atlantic
3 days ago
- General
- Atlantic
Oceans Awash in Plastic Waste
An estimated 11 million metric tons of plastic enter oceans each year, according to the U.S. State Department—and some of it accumulates in highly visible ways. Şebnem Coşkun / Anadolu / Getty Turkish free diver Şahika Ercümen dives amid plastic waste on the Ortaköy coastline to raise awareness of plastic pollution in the oceans, and to observe the conditions in the Bosphorus Strait in Istanbul, Turkey, on June 27, 2020. Nhac Nguyen / AFP / Getty A Vietnamese woman gathers shells in a coastal forest littered with plastic waste that stuck in branches after it was washed up by the rising tide, in Thanh Hoa province, about 150 kilometers south of Hanoi, Vietnam, on May 18, 2018. Nina Gomes recovers a discarded plastic bag from ocean waters near the Copacabana beach in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on March 19, 2024. Bags of plastic waste and garbage recovered from the Great Pacific Garbage Patch are unloaded at the Port of Victoria in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada, on July 23, 2024. The Ocean Cleanup is a nonprofit organization founded in 2013 that develops and deploys technologies to rid the world's oceans of plastic. A plastic ball floats in the Strait of Gibraltar, about 6.8 miles (11 kilometers) away from the nearest shore, near Barbate, Spain, on July 31, 2018. Bhushan Koyande / Hindustan Times / Getty Children walk through tons of plastic waste on a shallow shoreline near Badhwar Park in Mumbai, India, on June 4, 2025. Raşid Necati Aslim / Anadolu / Getty A giant 11-meter-long whale sculpture called Whale on the Wharf , made of recycled plastic waste, is placed in London's Canary Wharf area on April 15, 2025, to draw attention to plastic pollution in the oceans. In this photo taken on October 22, 2019, plastic and other debris sit on a beach on Midway Atoll in the northwestern Hawaiian Islands. According to a study released in 2020, more than a million tons a year of America's plastic trash isn't ending up where it should. The equivalent of as many as 1,300 plastic grocery bags per person is landing in places such as oceans and roadways. In this photo from October 22, 2019, small pieces of plastic waste are shown in the decomposed carcass of a seabird on a beach on Midway Atoll. In one of the most remote places on Earth, Midway Atoll is a wildlife sanctuary that should be a safe haven for seabirds and other marine animals. Instead, creatures here struggle to survive as their bellies fill with plastic from faraway places. Josep Lago / AFP via Getty This photo taken on January 12, 2024, shows plastic nurdles at La Pineda beach in Tarragona, Spain. Cem Ozdel / Anadolu / Getty Modou Fall, a Senegalese environmental activist also known as 'Plastic Man,' is raising awareness about environmental pollution with his costume made of hundreds of plastic bags. He's shown here in Dakar, Senegal, on March 27, 2025. The 55-year-old Plastic Man organizes discussions and various events to educate the public about environmental pollution and climate change. Wearing his plastic outfit and carrying a note on his chest reading Africa is not a trash can , he walks the streets and beaches of Dakar to highlight the impact of plastic use on the environment. Olivier Morin / AFP / Getty This photo shows several dead herring trapped in a plastic packaging net on May 3, 2023, near Pietarsaari, Finland, as the late spring's sea ice was melting slowly. Benson Ibeabuchi / AFP / Getty A view of a canal that empties into Lagos Lagoon, clogged with rigid foam and single-use plastic, at Obalende in Lagos, Nigeria, on January 23, 2024. Agung Parameswara / Getty Small pieces of plastic that washed ashore on Kedonganan Beach and were collected in Kedonganan, Bali, Indonesia, shown on February 2, 2021. In Bali, known for its beaches and sunsets, the northwest monsoon brings vast amounts of plastic waste to its world-famous shores. Volunteers from a nongovernmental organization hold hands after cleaning the São Conrado beach in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on June 8, 2023, as part of World Oceans Day. Tahsin Ceylan / Anadolu / Getty Divers from the Turkish Underwater Sports Federation and Kas Underwater Association team carry out underwater cleaning operations off the coast of Antalya's Kas district on May 4, 2025. During the sea-cleaning operation, a large variety of items such as cellphones, plastic chairs, plates, forks, hats, glass, and plastic bottles were removed. Mladen Antonov / AFP / Getty A wave carrying plastic waste and other rubbish washes up on a beach in Koh Samui in the Gulf of Thailand on January 19, 2021. Li Xinjun / Xinhua / Getty Primary-school students clean up garbage at Binhai Park in Rongcheng City, in east China's Shandong Province, on June 4, 2025.
Yahoo
16-05-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Birds on a Remote Island Make 'Gut-Wrenching Crunching Sounds' Because They Are Full of Littered Plastics
Researchers in Australia have discovered excessive amounts of plastic in birds on the remote Lord Howe Island The birds have plastic making up about 20% of their body mass, which can cause the birds to crunch when both dead and alive Scientists say they found one bird with 778 individual pieces of plastic inside its bodyScientists in Australia have discovered a disturbing new feature of the birds found around the remote Lord Howe Island in New South Wales: they crunch. The picturesque landscape, located about a two-hour flight from Sydney, is home to a variety of wildlife. Unfortunately, this far-flung location doesn't protect the island's animals from the increase in discarded plastics. Ecologist Alex Bond, principal curator at Britain's Natural History Museum, shared with The Washington Post that during a recent trip to Lord Howe Island, he and a team of researchers found a bird with 778 pieces of plastic packed in its stomach "like a brick." "We're talking items up to and including the size of bottle caps and tetra pack lids, cutlery, clothes pegs, the takeaway soy sauce fish bottle that you get from restaurants," Bond noted. "That's the sort of thing that we're finding in the stomachs of these 80-day-old chicks." Bond works with Adrift Labs, an organization that studies the impact of plastic pollution on the world's oceans. Some of the birds the organization discovered on Lord Howe Island — both alive and dead — had so much plastic in their bodies that it amounted to 20% of the birds' total mass. Many birds made what Bond described as a "gut-wrenching crunching sound" when pressed on their sternum. "In the most severely impacted birds, you can hear that while they are still alive," he added. Never miss a story — sign up for to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories. Dr. Jennifer Lavers, a marine scientist working with Adrift Labs, told ABC News Australia, "There is now so much plastic inside of the birds you can feel it on the outside of the animal when it is still alive." She brought Peter Whish-Wilson, a senator for Tasmania, to see the affected animals on the island. "We are poisoning this planet and killing nature by the way we are living and the decisions we are making," Whish-Wilson told ABC News Australia of what he learned. Bond believes the birds on the island are a sign of what's coming. "The things that we're seeing now in sable shearwaters are things that we're absolutely going to see in a lot more species in the years and decades to come," Bond told The Washington Post. According to Recycle Track Systems, an additional 33 billion tons of plastic enter marine environments annually. In April, a new sculpture of a whale made entirely out of recycled plastics found in the ocean was unveiled in London's Canary Wharf. The piece, titled Whale on the Wharf (Skyscraper), was created to highlight the impact of plastic pollution. Read the original article on People
Yahoo
16-05-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Birds on a Remote Island Make 'Gut-Wrenching Crunching Sounds' Because They Are Full of Littered Plastics
Researchers in Australia have discovered excessive amounts of plastic in birds on the remote Lord Howe Island The birds have plastic making up about 20% of their body mass, which can cause the birds to crunch when both dead and alive Scientists say they found one bird with 778 individual pieces of plastic inside its bodyScientists in Australia have discovered a disturbing new feature of the birds found around the remote Lord Howe Island in New South Wales: they crunch. The picturesque landscape, located about a two-hour flight from Sydney, is home to a variety of wildlife. Unfortunately, this far-flung location doesn't protect the island's animals from the increase in discarded plastics. Ecologist Alex Bond, principal curator at Britain's Natural History Museum, shared with The Washington Post that during a recent trip to Lord Howe Island, he and a team of researchers found a bird with 778 pieces of plastic packed in its stomach "like a brick." "We're talking items up to and including the size of bottle caps and tetra pack lids, cutlery, clothes pegs, the takeaway soy sauce fish bottle that you get from restaurants," Bond noted. "That's the sort of thing that we're finding in the stomachs of these 80-day-old chicks." Bond works with Adrift Labs, an organization that studies the impact of plastic pollution on the world's oceans. Some of the birds the organization discovered on Lord Howe Island — both alive and dead — had so much plastic in their bodies that it amounted to 20% of the birds' total mass. Many birds made what Bond described as a "gut-wrenching crunching sound" when pressed on their sternum. "In the most severely impacted birds, you can hear that while they are still alive," he added. Never miss a story — sign up for to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories. Dr. Jennifer Lavers, a marine scientist working with Adrift Labs, told ABC News Australia, "There is now so much plastic inside of the birds you can feel it on the outside of the animal when it is still alive." She brought Peter Whish-Wilson, a senator for Tasmania, to see the affected animals on the island. "We are poisoning this planet and killing nature by the way we are living and the decisions we are making," Whish-Wilson told ABC News Australia of what he learned. Bond believes the birds on the island are a sign of what's coming. "The things that we're seeing now in sable shearwaters are things that we're absolutely going to see in a lot more species in the years and decades to come," Bond told The Washington Post. According to Recycle Track Systems, an additional 33 billion tons of plastic enter marine environments annually. In April, a new sculpture of a whale made entirely out of recycled plastics found in the ocean was unveiled in London's Canary Wharf. The piece, titled Whale on the Wharf (Skyscraper), was created to highlight the impact of plastic pollution. Read the original article on People
BBC News
11-04-2025
- Science
- BBC News
Whale on the Wharf: New sculpture made from plastic waste
People walking through Canary Wharf in central London might have had a bit of a surprise when they saw a blue whale leaping out of the don't worry, it's only a sculpture!The giant blue statue stands at four storeys tall, and is made from plastic waste and recycled Whale on the Wharf (Skyscraper), it's been created by American designers StudioKCA to highlight the impact of plastic pollution in the oceans. To make the blue whale itself, the designers worked with the Hawaii Wildlife Fund to collect plastic waste from Hawaiian beaches. They used the litter they found to build the 11 metre tall sculpture - but it's not just the whale that's made from recycled mix of concrete that was used to make the base that the whale rests on contains used coffee grounds from restaurants and cafes in Canary to Canary Wharf London,190 tonnes of spent coffee grounds is produced in the area every year. What is plastic pollution? Plastic pollution is when plastic waste ends up in the environment, and it can damage our oceans, rivers, lakes and March 2025, a new report found that the amount of plastics on beaches in the UK has increased by nearly 10%.And a 2020 research paper published in a journal called Science found that 19 to 23 million metric tons of worldwide plastic waste entered oceans and water habitats in to UK charity Whale and Dolphin Conservation, that's more than the combined weight of every single blue whale on artists Jason Klimoski and Lesley Chang, who designed the sculpture, said: "Whale on the Wharf is a physical example of why we need to change how we use and dispose of plastic in the world today."
BBC News
11-04-2025
- Business
- BBC News
Canary Wharf whale sculpture a reminder of plastic waste in oceans
A large blue whale sculpture has been unveiled at London's Canary Wharf as a reminder of the millions of tonnes of plastic waste swimming in the Atlantic and Pacific York-based architecture and design firm StudioKCA worked with the Hawaii Wildlife Fund to build the 11m (3.3ft) tall sculpture from plastic litter on the beaches of Hawaii. Its concrete base is made of spent coffee grounds from Canary Wharf's cafes and restaurants."There is more plastic swimming in our oceans than there are whales," said artists Jason Klimoski and Lesley Chang. "Whale on the Wharf is a physical example of why we need to change how we use and dispose of plastic in the world today, and we're thrilled to be showcasing this piece for the first time in the UK in Canary Wharf's waters."Whale on the Wharf (Skyscraper) is the latest artwork to join the Canary Wharf public art collection. The sculpture is made from sustainable elements, not just recycled plastic, and according to the Canary Wharf Group (CWG) has a first-of-its-kind, low-carbon concrete underwater 2009, developers CWG said it has sent zero waste to landfill from its managed areas and has put the sculpture in place to show its commitment to reducing waste and promoting a circular Harries at CWG said: "Our commitment to sustainability extends beyond the recycled plastic used in the sculpture – the installation process has also been carefully considered to reduce its carbon footprint. "Whether visitors come to the Wharf specifically to see this iconic sculpture up close, or it catches their eye when passing through, we hope it provides everyone with some pause for thought."
