"Dear friends coordinators (U.S. and International) of the International Coastal Cleanup,

I am Brazilian and I am conducting a research on the routes of marine debris (Debris Sources: Ocean/Waterway Activities) in the oceans.

I have therefore asked seamen of the 7 seas to put messages in plastic bottles into the ocean including their geographic coordinates and the date when the bottle was thrown into the ocean.

I am writing to you to ask you to cooperate in the sense that when you find messages (with coordinates) during the Cleanup you tell me the content of the message (if possible send me the message via email) and the place where it was found. This information is important in order to determine the routes of marine debris in the oceans.

Within 86 km of beach at Costa dos Coqueiros, north coast of the Federal State of Bahia, Brazil, I collected in a four day walk 730 pieces of garbage (mineral water, beverages, food, cleaning products, cosmetic products, lubricants, writing materials, insecticides) coming from the ocean. I identified the garbage and the countries where it was fabricated. Altogether, there was garbage from 47 different countries.

When walking along this stretch of the Bahian Coast it is possible to walk up to 25 km between villages without seeing any people or houses. However, you see a lot of garbage.

Due to the movement of the beach (tides, wind, rain), this garbage is buried transforming Costa dos Coqueiros into a cemetery of industrial garbage. Besides, this garbage has caused the deaths of sea animals (birds, turtles, dolphins, and baby Jubarte-Whales).

I burrowed holes of one cubic meter into the sand and I found up to 16 pieces of garbage per hole. It is nature itself which is taking up the responsibility of hiding the dirt caused by human beings.

I found a bottle (which had not been buried yet) of mineral water with a message (see attachment). This message by an Italian sailor included the name of the boat, the contact of the sailor, the date when it was thrown into the ocean and the geographic coordinates.
The place where it was found is 3.200 km off Costa dos Coqueiros.

Assuming that the bottle with the message arrived at the beach the day I found it, it would have made the distance within 135 days.

Besides this messages by the Italian sailor I found religious messages and love letters but those were without geographic coordinates and therefore did not help much. In the next email I will send you some graphs, registers of the garbage, texts und photographs (including one of a Japanese Shampoo with the tooth of a fish that got stuck in it) which are part of the research on marine debris at Costa dos Coqueiros.

I thank you already for your attention and cooperation and wish you lots of success for the Cleanup 2004.

Best regards,
Fabiano Prado Barretto"

Webpage: Projeto Praia Local, Lixo Global

Email: marinedebris@globalgarbage.org

<< Back to Articles and Links

Last Updated: Saturday, 5th September 2003