Moby-Duck

1. An Accidental Odyssey Begins with a Fable

I just wanted to learn what had really happened, where the toys had drifted and why.

A simple question. The author's journey starts with a seemingly simple question sparked by a student's essay about a lucky rubber duck: what happened to the 28,800 bath toys lost at sea in 1992? This anecdote, initially a provincial newspaper story, morphed into a widely reported fable, inspiring children's books and capturing the public imagination.

From fact to fable. The true story involved 7,200 each of red beavers, blue turtles, green frogs, and yellow ducks, lost when a container fell off the Evergreen Ever Laurel near the Aleutians. Over time, in media retellings, these diverse plastic animals were simplified into just "rubber ducks," highlighting how narrative can transform complex reality into a more digestible, often whimsical, story.

The call to adventure. Driven by curiosity and a sense of personal drift (facing fatherhood, questioning his life), the author decides to follow the trail of the toys wherever it leads. This transforms a journalistic inquiry into a personal odyssey, seeking not just facts about ocean currents but deeper truths about the material world, globalization, and humanity's impact.

2. Ocean Currents Reveal Hidden Paths and Patches

Questions, I’ve learned since, can be like ocean currents.

Following the drift. The author connects with oceanographer Curtis Ebbesmeyer, who used reports from beachcombers and a computer model (OSCURS) to track the toys' journey. This revealed complex, erratic drift routes influenced by winds, currents, and even climate phenomena like El Niño.

Gyres and garbage. The models predicted toys would enter major ocean current systems:

• The North Pacific Subpolar Gyre (counterclockwise, circulating near Alaska and Siberia)
• The North Pacific Subtropical Gyre (clockwise, circulating between North America and Asia)
  The latter's calm center accumulates debris, forming the "Great North Pacific Garbage Patch," a vast area of plastic pollution.

Beyond the models. OSCURS couldn't track toys into the Arctic ice. Ebbesmeyer used experiments (freezing, hammering toys) and historical data (like the Jeannette and Fram expeditions) to predict an Arctic passage, suggesting some toys might eventually reach the Atlantic via Fram Strait and the Labrador Current, potentially explaining a reported sighting in Maine.

3. Plastic Pollution: An Unseen, Accumulating Threat

There are things afloat now that will never sink.

A new kind of debris. Unlike natural flotsam (wood, carcasses) or historical debris (pumice), plastic persists indefinitely, breaking into smaller pieces but never fully biodegrading. This creates a growing problem of microplastics accumulating in the ocean.

Toxic hitchhikers. Plastic polymers have a peculiar propensity to adsorb hydrophobic, lipophilic toxins (POPs) like DDT and PCBs from seawater. These "poison pills" can enter the food chain when ingested by marine life, potentially bioaccumulating up to humans.

Impacts on wildlife. The author encounters evidence of plastic's harm:

• Ghost nets (derelict fishing gear) that continue to entangle and kill marine animals.
• Albatross chicks on Midway Island found with stomachs full of plastic debris, raising concerns about starvation and toxin exposure.
• Microplastics found in plankton samples, suggesting widespread contamination at the base of the food web.

4. The Source: Inside the Workshop of the World

I’d read that 70 percent of the toys we Americans buy—about $22 billion worth—are wrought by low-wage factory workers in Guangdong Province...

Following the chain. The author traces the toys' origin to the Pearl River Delta in China, the "workshop of the world." He visits the Po Sing plastics factory in Dongguan, where the lost Floatees were made, seeking to understand the manufacturing process and the lives of the workers.

From nurdles to ducks. The factory visit reveals the transformation of raw plastic pellets (nurdles) into finished toys using processes like extrusion blow-molding. The author witnesses a worker making yellow ducks, connecting the abstract global supply chain to a specific human action.

The human cost and complexity. The factory operates with low wages and long hours, though conditions may vary. The industry faces rising costs and pressure for safety compliance, leading to issues like the 2007 toy recalls. The author encounters layers of secrecy and subcontracting, highlighting the difficulty of fully understanding the production process and its ethical implications.

5. Container Ships Navigate Perilous Seas and Mysteries

To appreciate the full extent of the damage the APL China had suffered, one must first appreciate the full extent of the APL China.

Giants of commerce. The author seeks to understand the context of the toy spill by traveling on a modern container ship, the Hanjin Ottawa. These post-Panamax vessels are colossal feats of engineering, capable of carrying thousands of containers, linking global production and consumption.

Acts of God and physics. The loss of containers, like the toys or the APL China's cargo, is often attributed to "severe weather" or "acts of God." However, the author learns about the physics of ship motion (synchronous and parametric rolling) and the increasing risks taken by larger ships traveling faster routes, suggesting that human design and operational choices play a significant role in maritime disasters.

Life at sea. The voyage reveals the isolated, often monotonous lives of the international crew (mostly Filipino oilers and deckhands, German officers). Despite technological advancements, seafaring remains a dangerous profession, and the vastness and power of the ocean are still palpable, contrasting with the routine and confinement of life aboard.

6. The Arctic: A Rapidly Changing, Sticky Labyrinth

It’s a Hyperborean winter scene.—It’s the breaking-up of the ice-bound stream of Time.

Into the ice. The author joins a Canadian Coast Guard icebreaker expedition through the Northwest Passage, seeking to follow the potential Arctic route of the toys. This journey reveals the Arctic as a dynamic, rapidly changing environment, not a static frozen wilderness.

Signs of change. The expedition encounters less multiyear ice and more difficult-to-navigate "sticky" first-year ice, indicative of warming temperatures. Scientists aboard study sediment cores and water samples to understand the pace and impacts of climate change, including invasive species and altered currents.

The Arctic's connection. The journey reinforces the idea that the Arctic is not isolated but connected to global ocean currents and climate systems. The melting ice and changing currents have implications far beyond the polar region, linking this remote wilderness to temperate latitudes and global environmental concerns.

7. The Quest Reveals the Limits of Knowledge and Vision

To see! To see!—this is the craving of the sailor, as of the rest of blind humanity.

Seeking clarity. Throughout his journey, the author encounters the limits of human perception and scientific knowledge. From Ebbesmeyer's models losing the toys in the Arctic to Amy Bower's altimetric maps being out of date, the ocean's complexity often defies precise understanding.

Invisible phenomena. Many crucial aspects of the ocean and climate are invisible to the naked eye:

• Mesoscale eddies (underwater storms)
• Microplastics and adsorbed toxins
• Rising CO2 levels and ocean acidification
• Subtle variations in ocean topography

The paradox of sight. The author, acutely myopic, reflects on how technology (satellites, computer models, instruments) extends our vision but also mediates our experience. He contrasts scientific sight with the subjective vision of artists and the limited, often misleading, sight offered by media images and advertising.

8. The Fable Endures, But Reality Demands Reckoning

The story I and others were enchanted by was enchanting because it was illusory, and no matter how much forensic evidence I assembled, it would remain illusory.

The power of narrative. The legend of the rubber ducks lost at sea, a simple, whimsical fable, proved more compelling and enduring than the complex, often grim realities the author discovered about plastic pollution, global trade, and environmental change. The fable offered enchantment; the reality, bewilderment.

Beyond the anecdote. The journey transforms the simple anecdote into a lens through which to view larger, interconnected issues:

• Globalization and the hidden costs of consumption
• The science of oceanography and climate change
• The challenge of environmental responsibility in a complex world
• The tension between human desire and ecological limits

An ongoing experiment. The author concludes that the accidental experiment of plastic pollution is ongoing, with uncertain long-term consequences. While individual actions like beach cleanups have symbolic value, addressing the problem requires systemic change, confronting the economic and cultural forces that drive the production and disposal of plastic.

The enduring mystery. Despite the knowledge gained, the ultimate fate of most of the lost toys remains unknown, scattered across vast oceans and buried on remote shores. The author's quest, like the ocean itself, remains full of both wonder and unresolved mysteries.

Last updated: June 26, 2025