In July of 2022, two scientists descended to the Challenger Deep—the deepest spot in the oceans. The first thing they saw on the bottom wasn’t a new species of life or some other exotic wonder. It was a glass beer bottle—sitting seven miles deep.

Litter isn’t limited to the giant “garbage patches” on the ocean surface. It’s found on the bottom as well—even in the deepest of all locations. It’s been seen on the floors of all the oceans and seas, including the Arctic and Southern oceans.

A recent study, for example, used video cameras to survey a portion of the Calypso Deep—a three-mile-deep spot in the Mediterranean Sea, near Greece. The cameras recorded about 150 items of trash: paper bags and cartons, glass bottles and jars, and lots and lots of plastic—bags, crates, bottles, fishing gear, and more. Based on that sample, researchers calculated the region should average about 70 thousand pieces of trash per square mile.

The spots with the highest estimated density of trash yet recorded are a couple of mile-deep canyons in the South China Sea: 135 thousand pieces per square mile.

Trash washes out to sea from rivers, is lost from ships, or is deliberately dumped. And it’s a menace to any organisms on the sea floor. It can entangle them, or strangle or poison them if they try to eat it. And with an estimated seven million tons of trash added to the oceans every year, the problem will only get worse in the years ahead.

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