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Old 05-07-2014, 10:29   #46
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Re: Do You Dump Your Trash Over Board?

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Where is it allowed by law to throw aluminium,steel and bottles overboard?
MARPOL Trash Placards
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Old 05-07-2014, 10:41   #47
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Re: Do You Dump Your Trash Over Board?

What a conundrum here we have for sure. There appears to be no absolute right answer. Its easy to say no, period, to dumping anything overboard ever. That doing so will pollute the oceans irreversibly but what about bringing all the garbage back to shore where, in most places, no recycling exists. The same junk then pollutes the land. And, in time, that same garbage you so thoughtfully hauled all the way back to shore might end up washing out to sea anyway causing more environmental damage close to shore than the damage it would have caused if dumped far away from land in deep water. Its a damed if I do thing. Personally I'm a good camper guy; I leave places I visit cleaner than when I got there-always. This applies to sailing as well. Only biodegradables go overboard. Everything else is hauled back. Thats my "right" thing to do but it might just not be for others.
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Old 05-07-2014, 10:41   #48
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Do You Dump Your Trash Over Board?

Er. Maybe I'm blind? Still can't see it there..
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Old 05-07-2014, 10:49   #49
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Re: Do You Dump Your Trash Over Board?

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Er. Maybe I'm blind? Still can't see it there..
+1

Also what is a "special area" in the MARPOL placard?
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Old 05-07-2014, 11:03   #50
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Re: Do You Dump Your Trash Over Board?

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Like backpackers.
My point exactly. I did a lot of what you might call extended wilderness tripping in my youth. The longest time I spent in the field was 63 days with a single resupply, cached by sea plane we did not meet.

We packed out 8-1/2" weeks worth of trash and delivered it to a third world trash pit ourselves on foot and by hand and this was in the mid-eighties, at a time when the Pardeys were recommending people throw plastic in the ocean.

You can rationalize it however you want but that won't change the fact that you are polluting the wilderness for the sake of your own personal convenience every time you throw anything that is not organic overboard.

I really don't understand how having garbage spread all over the earth is preferable to having it semi-contained in a third world trash pit

In the trash pit it is somewhat confined in an area already ruined. Is it so much to ask that you put trash in its place, not the ocean?

Sure I have seen young people litter. I don't think it is a small coincidence that I mainly see them doing it in low-rent neighborhoods. What's your point? Are you saying that because you have a low-rent mentality, it's okay that you litter?

I concede that in the grand scheme of things metal and glass overboard offshore by cruising sailors isn't likely going to be the death of us.

However, any assertion that what you are doing isn't littering or is somehow a good thing is ridiculous. I think probably most who would argue otherwise know this but can't admit it, I understand I am a human too.

At least if it goes into a third world landfill it's only adding to an existing concentrated blight. And hey, we're talking the dirt-world here which is basically ruined already anyway.

At the very least throwing metal and glass away is throwing away the non-renewable energy expending in making it and in a world increasingly challenged for energy resources that waste should not be discounted as insignificant.

You're a sailor, is it so much to ask that you become a defender of your domain instead of a destroyer?

P.S. Yes Ted Nugget, I did find the silver Sigg bottle with your note left behind at a location you flew to via turboprop but which I got to by foot and paddle. You're a litterbug. I packed out your Sigg bottle and note with all the rest of our garbage and dismantled the cairn you had erected to contain your rubbish. Environmentalist you are not despite your claims.

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Old 05-07-2014, 11:06   #51
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Re: Do You Dump Your Trash Over Board?

Even forgetting the rules and regs, I just don't see the purpose of dumping trash over board. You brought it with you. Why not take it back with you? Crush it or compact it and it will take less space than it did. And of all the gadgets and equipment on our boat, we love our compactor. Don't know why more boats don't have them. Honestly, don't know why more homes don't.
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Old 05-07-2014, 11:11   #52
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Re: Do You Dump Your Trash Over Board?

When I leave home, I follow the adage of "Pack it in, pack it out. Leave nothing but footprints. Take nothing but pictures."

I'm going to do the same offshore as well. It doesn't take more than a couple of pieces of litter per person to add up really quickly. I'd hate to see the pristine beaches that cost us so much to get to turn into a litter filled nightmare like many of the border towns south of us.
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Old 05-07-2014, 11:14   #53
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Re: Do You Dump Your Trash Over Board?

I'm kinda confused and bemused with this discussion. Are some people arguing that we SHOULD be dumping inorganic garbage into the seas? I don't understand

I have cruised for up to seven weeks at a time without touching a dock. I discard organic waste when not in enclosed anchorages. I do not toss anything else -- why would I? I obviously have the space to bring the cans, paper and containers out with me, so why wouldn't I take them back in?

It's true, some forms of garbage disposal is really bad. Where available, modern landfills are a vast improvement. Recycling is good (although has a lot of problems). But this whole **if you can't be perfect there's no point in doing anything** OR, **everyone else is polluting, so what's the point** perspective seems rather juvenile. My attitude has always been that I can only manage what I do. Just b/c everyone else is behaving poorly does not mean I have to.
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Old 05-07-2014, 11:16   #54
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Re: Do You Dump Your Trash Over Board?

I stand corrected its not longer allowed. Regardless, its unenforceable.
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Old 05-07-2014, 11:18   #55
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Re: Do You Dump Your Trash Over Board?

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Originally Posted by socaldmax View Post
When I leave home, I follow the adage of "Pack it in, pack it out. Leave nothing but footprints. Take nothing but pictures."

I'm going to do the same offshore as well. It doesn't take more than a couple of pieces of litter per person to add up really quickly. I'd hate to see the pristine beaches that cost us so much to get to turn into a litter filled nightmare like many of the border towns south of us.
Things dumped offshore have absolutely no path to get to a beach, other than geological time and/or plate tectonics.

Putting things in a local island's trash pit is almost a guarantee that your stuff will end up littering a beach.

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Old 05-07-2014, 11:25   #56
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Re: Do You Dump Your Trash Over Board?

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I stand corrected its not longer allowed. Regardless, its unenforceable.

That's correct
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Old 05-07-2014, 11:25   #57
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Re: Do You Dump Your Trash Over Board?

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Originally Posted by Mike OReilly View Post
I'm kinda confused and bemused with this discussion. Are some people arguing that we SHOULD be dumping inorganic garbage into the seas? I don't understand

I have cruised for up to seven weeks at a time without touching a dock. I discard organic waste when not in enclosed anchorages. I do not toss anything else -- why would I? I obviously have the space to bring the cans, paper and containers out with me, so why wouldn't I take them back in?

It's true, some forms of garbage disposal is really bad. Where available, modern landfills are a vast improvement. Recycling is good (although has a lot of problems). But this whole **if you can't be perfect there's no point in doing anything** OR, **everyone else is polluting, so what's the point** perspective seems rather juvenile. My attitude has always been that I can only manage what I do. Just b/c everyone else is behaving poorly does not mean I have to.
No, what I have been arguing is perspective. In many places, if you take your inorganic trash to land - and you can actually find a receptacle for it - that trash will be taken and dumped in a mangrove area adjacent to a beach. Any reasonable storm or heavy inland rain will then flood that area and the trash will be sent all over the place.

Some of us cruise for 7 months or several years without ever touching a dock. Some of us cruise in areas with absolutely no garbage facilities at all other than people just dumping their trash out the back of their living areas.

In these cases, dumping appropriate non-burnables offshore is far more environmentally sound than what is available else-wise. And open burning plastics and other nasty things is far more favorable than dumping them, even though burning is considered a very bad thing in modern areas.

Again, a perspective is needed. If one doesn't have one from experience, it pays to listen to those who do.

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Old 05-07-2014, 11:33   #58
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Re: Do You Dump Your Trash Over Board?

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Things dumped offshore have absolutely no path to get to a beach, other than geological time and/or plate tectonics.

Putting things in a local island's trash pit is almost a guarantee that your stuff will end up littering a beach.

Mark
Mark,
Gotta disagree with your point 1. Just Google Japan Tsunami garbage and you'll know what I mean. Ocean currents can and do in fact deposit garbage onto beaches from afar.

I do TOTALLY agree with your Point 2. I've seen it many many times.
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Old 05-07-2014, 11:38   #59
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Re: Do You Dump Your Trash Over Board?

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I really don't understand how having garbage spread all over the earth is preferable to having it semi-contained in a third world trash pit

Yes, I have been trying to tell you that you don't understand this.

In the trash pit it is somewhat confined in an area already ruined. Is it so much to ask that you put trash in its place, not the ocean?

Again, you don't understand. Please explain how trash piled into the mangroves at the edge of the water does not find its way into the ocean. The coastal ocean at that.

At least if it goes into a third world landfill it's only adding to an existing concentrated blight. And hey, we're talking the dirt-world here which is basically ruined already anyway.

This is a reprehensible statement. You should be ashamed.

At the very least throwing metal and glass away is throwing away the non-renewable energy expending in making it and in a world increasingly challenged for energy resources that waste should not be discounted as insignificant.

What???? Please tell me how throwing it into the mangroves recovers any of the renewable energy of it. Please also explain how much of what you think you recycle is actually being recycled.

You're a sailor, is it so much to ask that you become a defender of your domain instead of a destroyer?

Why are you labeling me as such? It is a cheap debating device along the lines of "have you quit beating your wife yet?". Would you like me to turn the tables on you? You may think you have a small carbon footprint (as you try to tell yourself and us below), but I promise you that you are raping resources and leaving the world a worse place far more than most cruising boats. This game does work with you - you just don't have the experiences and perspective to see that.

P.P.S. My first business venture after design school was making furniture from reclaimed extinct American Chestnut lumber in the early nineties. I've never bought a new car, only previously-owned trucks for work, which I drove into the ground. Never bought a new house, only rehabs, only multi families. Never had a lawn that wasn't a vegetable garden. Never didn't ride a bike or use mass transit to get to work except in a truck. I buy most of my food from a farmer. I live in one of the most densely populated cities in my country (check your carbon footprint zip code map). I average less than one jet-travel trip per year. I don't own a car and haven't in over a dozen years by choice. I live on a thirty year old boat and have no room in my life for consumer crap and I don't buy into the system. I used FSC Certified Sustainable Jatoba lumber that was over-run stock from a LEED certified project to replace my teak-and-holly cabin sole and I used PTSYP for my cockpit sole. Really the pot-kettle-black-game doesn't work with me, but I appreciate the sentiment.
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Old 05-07-2014, 11:39   #60
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Re: Do You Dump Your Trash Over Board?

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Mark,
Gotta disagree with your point 1. Just Google Japan Tsunami garbage and you'll know what I mean. Ocean currents can and do in fact deposit garbage onto beaches from afar.

I do TOTALLY agree with your Point 2. I've seen it many many times.
Let me be more clear - bottles and cans sunk in deep offshore water have no path to beaches. The tsunami garbage was all floating garbage. We would never toss anything that floated.

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