Flotsametrics and the Flating World

FLOTSAMETRICS and the Floating World

How One Man's Obsession with Runaway Sneakers And Rubber Ducks Revolutionized Ocean Science

By: Curtis Ebbesmeyer & Eric Scigliano

11/20/2010

Jose Hernandez

11/20/2010

EES-167

Speaking as a former Real Estate Agent, It has always baffled and intrigued my mind how a 1,000 square foot home, "a modest size house to say the least", overlooking the Monterey bay Ocean can be on the market, "for sale", for upward of one million dollars. Could the ocean view be worth a thousand percent more than the view of grapevines in Fresno County? Or seven hundred percent higher only twenty two miles away, in the east side of Salinas where I was brought up? The reality is that the ocean is natures Picasso, breathtaking at first glance, and its Mozart, with its brilliant, extraordinary and sometimes soothing sounds. It is distressing to know that, as valuable as our earth's oceans are to us, we treat them like our own personal toilet bowl. The "garbage patch"(Ebbesmeyer pg.xvi) collected in the North Pacific Gyre current, the size of the state of Texas, is the defining evidence of man's carelessness.

Curtis Ebbesmeyer, Ph.D. in oceanography from the University of Washington was the first person to coin the term "garbage patch" to describe the filth in the North Pacific Ocean. Dr. Ebbesmeyer received his undergraduate degree in mechanical engineering at California State University at Northridge, formally known as San Fernando Valley State College. He then decided to pursue graduate studies in the field of nuclear engineering and oceanography at the University of Washington. There he found his calling and decided to study oceanography, which at the time was a relatively obscure profession in the U.S., lagging far behind other countries. In the beginning of his carrier Dr. Ebbesmeyer made a name for himself by the study of the waters of Puget Sound, off the coast of the state of Washington, and its affects by the sewage runoff water. His understanding of water slabs, or "snarks"(Ebbesmeyer pg.11), as he later named the water slabs he observed in Dabob Bay near Puget Sound, was the beginning of a journey that led Dr. Ebbesmeyer to the Flotsam world.

In Dr. Ebbesmeyer's book "Flotsametrics and the Floating World How One Man's Obsession with Runaway Sneakers and Rubber Ducks Revolutionized Ocean Science" He writes about his in depth studies of flotsam and jetsam beginning from a graduate student at the University of Washington to a private oceanography consultant. "Jetsam is a floating object released deliberately out on the ocean, typically in the past, to save a threatened vessel"(Ebbesmeyer pg.245). Dr. Ebbesmeyer explains how the age old message in a bottle has endured for literally thousands of years in most human cultures around the world. Tossing a bottle with a message of distress, curiosity, deep secrets and even a rich woman's legal will of five million dollars to whoever found the bottle. He explains how bottles, although sometimes fragile, can last centuries on earth's oceans drifting along until finally it may alter its course from the current and land on some shore on some beach around the world. Earth's oldest garbage, although safe for the oceanic environment, like drift wood and pumice from volcanic activity was also a topic of interest. Dr. Ebbesmeyer explained how Pre-Columbus America's shores were sometimes littered with drift wood, shipwrecked European boats, sea beans which are cocoa tree seeds, and other items that landed up and down on the east coast. For centuries these sea beans were considered a treasured prize, of much value among Native North and South Americans. It's amazing to think how these trees spread around the world by releasing its seed into the ocean which then carries it to all corners of the world. A catastrophe on one continent assuming that all trees are eliminated still have a chance to repopulate in a different location. From this study Dr. Ebbesmeyer's had an epiphany which led to a theory of the origin of life. He wrote a paper that explains how the origin of life could have evolved on earth's first drifting rocks or volcanic pumice, millions perhaps even billions of years ago. These microbes then transferred into the ocean or even on land and were able to live and thrive and from there the chain of living beings would have begun. Although interesting, not enough evidence could be gathered to prove his theory.

The steel metal from the capsized boats that washed along the east coast was also of great value to the natives of the Americas. People would literally kill to obtain these scarce and precious metals for the simple fact that steel wasn't advanced technology in the Americas. Perhaps improving weapons as well as every day tools needed to survive in a much more primitive world. One of Dr. Ebbesmeyer's heroes was Christopher Columbus, which he cites, quoting some of Columbus's observations which that he logged on his voyage to the new world. Columbus observed the same sea beans, drift wood, and pieces of European ships, on the Florida and Caribbean coast that wash up till this present day. He also observed palm tree timber that would wash up in Europe and Africa, which did not exist in those regions. He concluded that he had found the source. By observing this Flotsam Columbus perhaps better understood the oceans currents rather than relying on just maps to sail to the new world.

Flotsam is floating objects on the ocean that was lost or accidentally released out to sea. Flotsam can be merchandise, like shoes or plastic toys, which are released by freighters that wreck out at sea like so many do each year. It can even be human remains, either deliberately or accidentally set out on the ocean. Dr. Ebbesmeyer explains how the weight of a human cadaver can determine its floatability. He also writes about how Japanese fisherman, or average sailors, occasionally survived being swept away on a drift and eventually landing on the Islands of Hawaii or even as far north as Russia. In 1813 there is an account of some Japanese drifters

...