André Marton Pedersen is Content producer aboard the Statsraad Lehmkuhl for the first leg of the One Ocean Expedition. A walk along one of the beaches in Lerwick, Shetland, inspired him to buy garbage bags instead of souvenirs.
– When we were in Lerwick, I had a few hours off and went to the local supermarket, Tesco, to look for souvenirs. It was so nice walking along the beach, a beautiful promenade - so I sat down on a bench and looked out over the sea, says André.
Trash between the rocks
Lerwick is a charming little town, and the weather was lovely, but André noticed that not everything was picture perfect.
– At first glance, the beach looked fairly clean. But when I looked more closely, I noticed a lot of trash between and partially under the rocks. And at that point, I just couldn’t sit there and do nothing, he explains.
So André went ahead to Tesco, but skipped the souvenirs, and bought large plastic garbage bags instead. He told the staff he was planning to clean the beach - and they agreed to take care of the waste afterward.
As he got started, other sailors from Statsraad Lehmkuhl passed by and asked what he was doing. When he explained, they asked if they could join in.
– Of course they could join! In the end, there were nine of us. We filled 13 large garbage bags in an hour and a half. There were loads of plastic bottles, empty cans, plastic bags - and quite a bit of old clothing, says André.
Although there are annual beach clean-ups on Shetland, the amount collected in such a short time showed just how much waste continues to wash ashore.
Mistaking plastic for food
Back on board, André spoke with Lucie Castorino, one of the expedition’s Science coordinators, about the plastic they’d found. Even everyday items like an empty water bottle or a plastic shopping bag can do serious harm in the ocean.
– Wind and weather break the plastic down into small pieces, which we call microplastics. Marine organisms think it’s food and eat it, Lucie explains.
Eating plastic instead of real food doesn’t end well. Many of the smallest organisms die from it. In larger animals like fish, those tiny plastic particles can make their way into muscle tissue.
– The plastic then releases chemicals that aren’t good for the fish - and not for us either, if we eat the fish she adds.
Lucie is happy that plastic shopping bags are now being banned in more and more countries.
– Many animals, like sea turtles, for example, mistake floating plastic bags for jellyfish. Their stomachs and intestines fill up with plastic, and they die, she says.
In Norway, everyone remembers the tragic case of the “plastic whale”, a Cuvier’s beaked whale that stranded near Sotra, just west of Bergen. When it was examined, its stomach was so full of plastic that there was no room left for food. The whale had quite literally starved to death.
Today, both the plastic contents of its stomach and the whale’s skeleton are on display at the University Museum in Bergen, a stark warning of the impact of marine pollution.
A personal connection
For André, the experience of cleaning the beach meant more than just helping the environment.
– You get to feel more connected to the place and the beach you're cleaning, he says. So now I feel like the beach in Lerwick is a little bit mine - and it’s a really good feeling to leave it a bit cleaner than when we found it.
His takeaway from the day is simple but powerful:
– No one can do everything, but everyone can do something!