A Plastic Ocean

A Plastic Ocean is a new documentary that looks at the problems that are caused when plastic waste goes into the sea. Watch the trailer and find out more about how plastic can be dangerous to sea animals and human health.

Instructions

Do the preparation task first. Then watch the video and do the exercise. Remember you can read the transcript at any time.

Preparation

Transcript

Narrator: I remember the first time I saw a blue whale.

Man on boat: Look, look! (… Wow!)

Narrator: I’d followed them since childhood.

Diver: Where do you think it’s from? Is it from a ship?

Narrator: I could see plastic everywhere.

Every year 8 million tons of plastic are dumped into our oceans

Presenter: We were in what we thought was a relatively pristine environment. I started to wonder what was happening in oceans elsewhere on the planet.

A journalist who loves the ocean

Narrator: Growing up, my world was the ocean. It’s where I feel the most spiritual.

And a champion who dives below

Diver: As a free diver, it was a place where I proved myself to myself. Finally have the opportunity to pay the sea back.

A crisis with global stakes

Narrator: Only a fraction of the plastic that we produce is recycled.

Man 2 on boat: This is never going to degrade. It’s got nowhere to go.

Narrator: It’s something that these animals are forced to endure because it was man-made and we put it into their environment.

Diver: The record is two hundred and seventy-six pieces of plastic inside one ninety-day-old chick. If the plastics are in the food chain for the dolphin then they're also in our food chain.

Woman on boat: Exactly!

Narrator: Communities are built on these landfill sites … So sweet potatoes, corn, sugar cane, all growing on forty years of garbage.

Do you have anything not wrapped in plastic?

… No!