Strange Maps has a map up about an ongoing story that, inexplicably, makes me happy: The Friendly Floatees. Wikipedia also has an entry.
The short version is that, in 1992, a shipment of rubber ducks bound from China to Tacoma, Washington, washed overboard in the Pacific Ocean. Since then, oceanographers have used them to track currents as they’ve made their way around the world and through the arctic ice.
That’s a cool story! Of course since they’re Chinese, I’m sure the lead levels in the oceans has increased significantly.
I’m surprised they all didn’t get sucked up in the North Pacific Gyre along with the other hundred million tons of plastic crap floating there.
It is interesting seeing how these things travel. I was biking down here in the Hoosier National Forest a couple of years ago when I found a mylar balloon just off the trail with a phone number written on it in marker. I looked up the number, and it was from the Kansas City area. I was hoping it was from California or something, but still Kansas City is kind of far away.