Great Pacific Garbage Patch

The garbage was removed from the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, an area between Hawaii and California, where litter and debris accumulate.

The remarkable journey of a multimillion-dollar plan to remove plastic from the Pacific began with a teenager's TEDx talk. In 2012, 18-year-old Boyan Slat proposed an invention to collect garbage from the ocean's surface. His talk went viral.

Seventy-nine thousand tons of plastic debris, in the form of 1.8 trillion pieces, now occupy an area three times the size of France in the Pacific Ocean between California and Hawaii, a scientific team reported on Thursday.

The garbage was removed from the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, an area between Hawaii and California, where litter and debris accumulate.

The remarkable journey of a multimillion-dollar plan to remove plastic from the Pacific began with a teenager's TEDx talk. In 2012, 18-year-old Boyan Slat proposed an invention to collect garbage from the ocean's surface. His talk went viral.

Seventy-nine thousand tons of plastic debris, in the form of 1.8 trillion pieces, now occupy an area three times the size of France in the Pacific Ocean between California and Hawaii, a scientific team reported on Thursday.