The tsunami that ravaged northeast Japan in March 2011 created the biggest single dumping of rubbish, sweeping some five million tonnes of shattered buildings, cars, household goods and other rubble into the sea. According to Japanese estimates about three-and-a-half million tonnes, sank immediately, leaving some 1.5 million tonnes of plastic, timber, fishing nets, shipping containers, industrial scrap and innumerable other objects to float deeper into the ocean.
According to Canadian officials, a 65-meter Japanese fishing boat that was lost more than a year ago in the tsunami, off the east coast of Japan, has been spotted 278 kilometers off the southern coast of Haida Gwaii islands, approximately 1,500 kilometers north of Vancouver. The “ghost ship” was spotted by a Canadian military air patrol, and it is believed that it has been adrift since March of the last year.
“It looks fairly sound and has rust streak from being out there for a year,” said Marc Proulx, the maritime coordinator of the Joint Rescue Coordination Center in Victoria, British Columbia.
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
||||
Officer of the Watch 