Kategorie: News
We need the ocean
Following a news article on the now quite serious state of our Mediterranean Sea in terms of plastic waste and microplastic pollution, we received an impressive video on the state of the oceans from our reader Sabrina Inderbitzi and we don't want to withhold it from you. Sabrina is a filmmaker. She makes films for nature and about people who stand up for nature.
On the motivation behind the Plastic Ocean video, Sabrina writes: "When I was diving in Lembeh in North Sulawesi a few years ago, I came down to the beach one beautiful morning and our dive boat was in the middle of a rubbish dump. The night before there was nothing there. Well, you can't talk about "nothing" in Indonesia, because there is actually waste on every beach, but I had never seen anything like this before on my many trips. The surface of the sea was covered with more than 10 metres of plastic and other waste that had washed up during the night.
That was the day I decided to film this disaster and show it to the world. During my few days in Lembeh, I filmed all the animals that lived in the rubbish and all the rubbish that was floating around in and under the water. After only 4 days, I had already collected a considerable amount of footage. More footage was taken during my following dives in Bali, Raja Ampat and the Banda Sea.
I didn't want to make a film that would overwhelm everyone, but one that would encourage people to protect the beauty of our seas. I wanted to contrast my wonderful images of Indonesia with the devastation and at the same time impart knowledge.
On a research trip I met Sarah-Jo Lobwein. Sarah is Australian and a marine biologist. She has taken up the fight against plastic and is campaigning for a plastic-free world. On the 10-day liveaboard through the most pristine places in Indonesia, we took microplastic samples and did beach clean ups. Easy enough in Indonesia. We were able to fill several trash bags on just one small beach each time. So she was the right person for my film to answer questions and give me the necessary knowledge. And that's how an interview and the short film Plastic Ocean came about.
Even if these images make you think, even make me really angry at times, there is still a spark of hope. One of the ten samples we took on the research trip did not have a single plastic particle in it. That gives me hope. So there are still plastic-free places in the world - albeit few. Maybe it's not too late to get a handle on the problem."
If you have good material about the current conditions in the ocean and a short story to go with it, please write to us at redaktion@taucher.net; we will be happy to publish your material on this topic that is so important to all of us.
Further information on the topic:
Robotic fish against microplastic
Plastic dump in the Mediterranean: 14 days of fun, 400 years of waste
Marine plastic pollution increases