First islands of floating garbage observed in the Black Sea have been reported by the Institute of Ecology and Evolution “A. N. Severtsov” of the Russian Academy of Sciences. “Scientists are concerned about the large number of garbage islands in the Black Sea”, Interfax.ru wrote, summarizing the results of an aerial survey of Black Sea dolphins and ecosystems in Russia at the end of September last year.
“There were 450 registrations of garbage islands of various sizes made during the survey. They consisted of packages, bags and sacks floating on the surface, as well as separate plastic structures, fragments of nets and buoys. Often, the garbage was concentrated in huge spots, over which the plane flew for several minutes”, notes Dimitri Glazov, Leading Researcher at the Institute of Ecology and Evolution at the Russian Academy of Sciences.
During the aerial survey of the marine areas of Ukraine, Romania, Bulgaria, Turkey and Georgia, conducted at the end of June last year, experts from the CeNoBS project reported a larger accumulation of marine litter in the waters of Ukraine, Bulgaria, Turkey and Georgia. The “streams” of litter following the tracks of large ships, as well as the oil spills in waters of Ukraine and Bulgaria, made a special impression then. The highest concentrations (over 100 items) of floating plastic litter were registered in the marine areas of Bulgaria (central part), Georgia (southern part) and Turkey (western and central part).
The litter that formed the “islands” and “streams”, observed by the experts, except those left by ship traffic, were most likely transferred from the large rivers flowing into the Black Sea – Danube, Dniester, Dnieper, Don, etc.
At the same time, most of this waste ends their water voyage along the coasts, including the much-appreciated sand beaches. Confirmation of this is the ongoing mapping of the pollution of Pomorie Lake with waste under the BioLearn project, one of the contaminated areas being the sand spit separating the lagoon from the sea.
