MEDIA RELEASE

Capt. Charles Moore will discuss the ‘Greatest Infection of the Sea,’ which is detailed in his new book, “Plastic Ocean: How a Sea Captain’s Chance Discovery Launched a Determined Quest to Save the Oceans” at 5-7 p.m. Wednesday, Jan. 4 at the West Hawaii Civic Center.

Plastic Ocean tells how Moore returns to an area known as The Great Pacific Garbage Patch, which he first encountered in 1997 after a trans-Pacific sailing race, and culls scientific samples with a game, but mostly neophyte crew.

The results are shocking — plastic caught in his nets outweigh zooplankton, the ocean’s food base, by a factor of six to one.

His research prompts a massive global reassessment of plastics’ invasiveness and raises profound questions about the implications of this man-made floating landfill.

Moore’s initial voyage, his subsequent trips back, his research into this startling discovery, his hard-won scientific credibility, and his dogged, game-changing efforts to get the world to pay attention to a looming plastic peril, are chronicled in Plastic Ocean.