Post #520544 by VampiressRN on Sun, Mar 28, 2010 9:34 AM

The 'Plastiki' Sets Sail Across the Pacific Ocean
by David Knowles

(March 27) -- With twin hulls constructed out of 12,500 plastic bottles, a one-of-a-kind boat is now sailing from San Francisco to Sydney, Australia, in an effort to draw attention to the growing amount of plastic debris piling up in the world's oceans.

For a little more than two years, a team of designers has been hard at work at San Francisco's Pier 31, fashioning a two-masted, 60-foot-long catamaran out of recyclable plastic materials that will be able to withstand the harsh conditions of the open Pacific Ocean.

"I'd personally never made a boat before," Matthew Grey, expedition director for Adventure Ecology, the London-based company responsible for the project, told AOL News. "It has been a steep learning curve."

Courtesy of Luca Babini
The "Plastiki," which is constructed out of 12,500 plastic bottles, departs from California on its journey through the Pacific.
Christened the "Plastiki," the boat is the brainchild of Adventure Ecology's founder, 31-year-old British explorer David de Rothschild. The name was inspired by the "Kon-Tiki," the raft on which Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl crossed the Pacific from South America to Tahiti in 1947.

In fact, Heyerdahl's grandson, Olav Heyerdahl, is one of six crew members aboard the Plastiki, which is set to travel 11,000 miles over the course of the next three months.

According to Adventure Ecology, more than 80 percent of all the trash in the ocean today is in the form of plastic. Because of swirling currents, that debris is pulled along until it collects in enormous swirling gyres in the Pacific that are said to cover an area twice the size of the state of Texas.

More than 1 million seabirds are killed after being caught in the plastic waste, and 100,000 mammals, such as sea turtles, die after ingesting it, environmentalists say.

"The crew have been sailing for seven days now," Grey said, "and they've already seen over 60 large pieces of trash floating by."

Fitted with 20 solar panels, two wind turbines and an electricity-generating stationary bike, the Plastiki is not your ordinary plastic boat. Sponsored by Hewlett-Packard, the vessel is equipped with an impressive array of mobile computing devices so that the crew can utilize social networking sites such as Twitter, Facebook and Flickr to update followers on their progress.

"Incredible to be in the hands of the mighty Pacific, steady 25kn, fairly wild sea bouncing us," the boat's skipper, Jo Royle, tweeted on March 25, referring to the 25-knot winds and 20-foot waves that the boat encountered on its sixth night at sea.

"Seasickness has been something a problem," Grey said. "Four of the six have never really had any ocean sailing experience."

The boat, however, is said by the crew to be holding up very well. And thanks to an elaborate Web site constructed by Hewlett-Packard, those interested can track the Plastiki's journey in real time, complete with photos, videos, and commentary from the crew.

Somewhere, Thor Heyerdahl is smiling.