From Japan With Love, and possibly some radiation

Those who live on the west coast of North America are no strangers to marine debris from Japan washing up on our doorstep. From barnacle-coated trash to coveted glass fishing floats, oriental flotsam gathers on our shores every spring. In 2014 though, beachcombers can likely expect a glut of debris specifically set adrift by the devastating tsunami which hit Japan on March 11th. This according to a model by researchers at the University of Hawaii (below).

The glass ball: A beachcomber's lament

This time of year is often a bit deflating. Winter has barely begun and the next couple of months promise only darkness and cold. Yet when I was growing up on the shores of the Pacific, this time of year was rivaled only by Christmas in terms of sheer excitement. The holidays might be over, but it was mere weeks until glass ball season.

In the first few months of the year, I would eagerly await the raging south-west winds, which often heralded exotic treasures from the open sea. If these storms sustained themselves for long enough, they would begin to transport objects from the North Pacific current straight to our doorstep on the BC coast.

The North Pacific Current runs from the open ocean east of Japan to the open ocean west of California and forms the northern portion of the North Pacific Gyre. At its eastern terminus, the warm Kuroshio current from the south collides with the arctic Oyashio Current to feed the North Pacific Current. This brings all sorts of unusual items from the coast of Japan into the middle of the Pacific Ocean. Most of this debris ends floating around in the Pacific or washes up on the shores of Hawaii, but given the right conditions, some would make it to North America.