Meet Captain Charles Moore
When it comes to raising awareness about plastic as a form of pollution, the contribution made by Captain Charles Moore cannot be overstated. Since 1997, after sailing through the calm waters of the Pacific Ocean between Hawaii and California, Captain Moore has been alerting the world to what he discovered during that one-week passage, namely “plastic as far as the eye could see. . . no matter what time of day I looked, plastic debris was floating everywhere: bottles, bottle caps, wrappers, fragments.”
It was two years later when Moore published his groundbreaking research showing that plastic outweighed zooplankton by 600% in this part of the ocean. By the time a similar study in 2002 showed that the coastal waters of California were impacted to nearly the same degree, referring to Captain Moore’s discovery as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch was commonplace and oceanographers worldwide were amplifying his concerns.
Captain Moore is famous for saying that the “ocean is downhill of everything,” and although he specializes in studying impacts to the ocean environment, the wisdom he has accumulated during his 80 years on the planet allows him to raise legitimate concerns about plastic pollution’s impact on our weather system. In addition to the nexus between climate and plastic that arises due to the production of this ubiquitous material, Captain Moore is raising concerns about the accumulation of nano- and micro-plastic particles in the atmosphere. He reports there is growing evidence that as these levels increase they will have a dramatic impact on climate similar to the way volcanic emissions effect weather.
I first met Captain Moore over 20 years ago in Hawaii, where he was living part time, upslope of the marina where he would dock the Algalita when he needed to find his land legs. Of all the sad news he had to report, I was most touched by his account of the tiny ocean creatures that surface during the night to gobble food who fill themselves with plastic particles instead and then die in massive numbers because they are not only starving but doomed to stay at the surface when the sun rises because the plastic they ingested has made them too buoyant.
I am not sure why this bothered me so much, but the suffering of these innocent creatures became a pivotal moment for me. Since then, I have, in my own way, been on the same path as Captain Moore, doing all I can to raise awareness about the damage created by our lust for plastic.
Captain Moore built the beloved vessel that carried him more than 150,000 sea miles during the 28-year period he traversed the Pacific Ocean and connected waterways in pursuit of pleasure and knowledge. As the founder of the Algalita Marine Research and Education Foundation 30 years ago, he has inspired a legion of followers, many of them scientists who regularly contribute to the body of knowledge related to ocean health. In 2020, he founded the Moore Institute for Plastic Pollution Research and continues to serve as its research director. . . this when he is not tending to his garden and sharing home grown vegetables with neighbors and friends.
Twenty-percent of the contributions made to support this website will go to the Algalita Marine Research and Education Foundation. As our capacity to source, curate and market handmade toys expands, 20% of the proceeds from those sales will go to this dedicated group of researchers and change makers as well.