What happens to the plastic floating on the Ocean ?

Did you ever wonder what happens to all those plastic bags that fly away
or
to the plastic bottles that you see in the Ocean when you spend the day at the shore ?

The the Great Pacific Garbage Patches are two large masses of ever-accumulating trash, known as the Western and Eastern Pacific Garbage Patches.
The Eastern Garbage Patch floats between Hawaii and California; scientists estimate its size as two times bigger than Texas [source: LA Times].
The Western Garbage Patch forms east of Japan and west of Hawaii. Each swirling mass of refuse is massive and collects trash from all over the world. The patches are connected by a thin 6,000-mile long current called the Subtropical Convergence Zone. Research flights showed that significant amounts of trash also accumulate in the Convergence Zone.

Those floating garbage patches were formed from our collective mindless consumption
and from a series of major loss of merchandise by cargo ships which finds its source
in our collective mindless consumption.

For more details:

Here is the Wikipedia entry:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Pacific_Gyre

and a seven minutes video clip:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Verhi88kR60]

Please reduce your use of plastic and recycle the plastic you use.