holiday

Setting off and enjoying fireworks to celebrate the Fourth of July is a beloved pastime. During this holiday, the skies light up in brilliant colors and designs, leaving us mesmerized and in awe. Whether lighting up sparklers at home or watching a large colorful aerial production, all fireworks leave behind more than memories, they also result in trash. 

Do you know what can dampen a perfectly good Father’s Day barbecue more than a rogue thunderstorm? That thunderstorm causing single-use disposables to be washed into our environment! This Father’s Day, as you’re celebrating the important father-figures in your life, ditch the disposables and other potential contributors to marine debris.

Happy World Ocean Day! Today is a day to stop and think about our ocean, how it helps us (so many ways!), and what we can do to make sure it stays healthy. This year’s theme is plastic pollution. Unfortunately, our ocean faces many threats, one of which is marine debris. Marine debris is a major issue that impacts our ocean and consequently, impacts us.

Learn more about plastic pollution– the most prevalent form of marine debris– and how we can work together to keep our ocean plastic-free.

Mother’s Day is almost here and is a great opportunity to celebrate one of the important mothers in all of our lives: Mother Earth. Take some time this weekend to celebrate all that Mother Earth has given us and show her some love. All mothers love a do-it-yourself or hand-made gift, so take some small actions to show her you care. Follow the 4Rs and refuse a straw in your drink when you go out for Mother’s Day brunch; reduce your use of single-use items by bringing your own bag to the grocery store when you’re shopping for ingredients to make mom breakfast in bed; treat your mom to a coffee in a reusable mug; and recycle (or better yet, upcycle or reuse!) the cardboard coupons your mom turns in for ‘one free hug.’

Earth Day is right around the corner! This year, it falls on this coming Sunday, April 22nd. Celebrate by taking the opportunity to join in the fight against marine debris and prevent trash from entering our ocean, waterways, and Great Lakes. There are lots of cleanup events happening on and around Earth Day; make sure you’re prepared by knowing what cleanups are happening in your area. We’ve put together a list of cleanups happening throughout the country to get you started. Don’t see a cleanup close to you? Start one yourself! Gather some friends, clean up your local community (please remember, safety first), and use the Marine Debris Tracker App to record what you find!

It’s Valentine’s Day, so take some time today to show our ocean some love. We get a lot from the ocean—food, travel, even clean air to breathe— so return the love by thinking about how you can help protect it from marine debris. Consider how you might contribute to the marine debris problem and think about changes you could make to help. Do you bring reusable bags to the grocery store? Do you drink out of a reusable bottle at work? Do you follow your municipality’s recycling regulations for items you can’t reuse? Following the 4R’s (reduce, reuse, recycle, refuse!) whenever you can makes a big difference for our ocean.

By: Caitlin Wessel, Gulf of Mexico Regional Coordinator for the NOAA Marine Debris Program

Mardi Gras is a fun occasion for many cities across the South, from New Orleans to Alabama. Bead necklaces and other items like moon pies, cups, and cheap toys are a Mardi Gras staple and are thrown to excited crowds lining the streets during parades that begin six weeks before Fat Tuesday. Unfortunately, many of these items are abandoned on the street and can easily wash down street drains and end up in streams, rivers, and eventually the Gulf of Mexico. Learn how our partners are working to reduce the environmental impacts of Mardi Gras while keeping the Mardi Gras spirit alive and well!

Monday is Martin Luther King, Jr. Day and let’s remember that it’s not just a day off from work and school, but a day to think about what it means for our country. To commemorate a great man who spent his life serving others, this day has become a time to come together to give back to our communities and volunteer our time to a good cause. If you’d like to participate in MLK Day of Service, consider joining a cleanup in your area. Cleaning up your local shoreline or even just your neighborhood can help prevent trash from becoming marine debris and can help to create a healthy ocean that we can all enjoy.

By: Amanda Laverty, Sea Grant Knauss Fellow for the NOAA Marine Debris Program

Happy New Year! Did you make any goals or resolutions for the upcoming year? Here at the Marine Debris Program, we are striving to reduce the amount of waste we produce annually. The EPA estimates that, on average, Americans generate 4.40 pounds of waste per person per day. Now that is a lot of trash and unfortunately, much of it becomes marine debris. The good news is that because we are the problem, we can be the solution too! By committing ourselves to one or more of the goals below, we can help move in the direction of a cleaner and healthier world. If we strive to reduce our individual impacts, we can make a huge difference together! Here are a few simple ways to get started.

As another year comes to a close, we like to take this time to look back on 2017 and look forward to the year ahead. This year, the NOAA Marine Debris Program saw over 18,300 students involved in marine debris education and outreach and more than 1,600 metric tons of debris removed from our shores! Check out our 2017 Accomplishments Report for more on what we’ve achieved this past year. Looking to 2018, we’re excited for the year ahead and we hope you are too! We resolve to continue our fight against marine debris in several ways. What are your resolutions? There are many efforts we can all resolve to make to get our ocean off to a good start in 2018.