Our oceans are increasingly affected by human activity. The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is now an area larger than the combined size of France, Germany and Spain, according to researchers from the Netherlands-based Ocean Cleanup Foundation, writing in the British journal Scientific Reports.

The researchers sent 30 ships into the Great Pacific Garbage Patch and monitored plastic waste from planes as it accumulated in the Pacific Ocean between California and Hawaii. According to the study, the Great Pacific Garbage Patch covers an area of nearly 1.6 million square kilometers -- an area larger than France, Germany and Spain combined.

In this area, floating more than 80,000 tons of garbage, mainly plastic bottles, bags and other, 16 times the previous estimate, equivalent to the weight of 500 passenger jets. That's the equivalent of 1.8 trillion pieces of plastic, or about 250 pieces for every person on Earth. This Great Pacific Garbage Patch is turning into a plastic monster.

Researchers found that in the 1970s, there were 0.4 kilograms of plastic waste per square kilometer in this area, but by 2015, that number had grown to 1.23 kilograms per square kilometer.

The researchers also looked at the size of plastic waste in the water. While plastic waste larger than 5 centimeters in diameter makes up more than 75 percent of the total weight, the amount of microplastics is greater, the Ocean Cleanup Foundation researchers said. This poses a potential threat to aquatic life, as Marine animals such as sea turtles and fish can mistake small pieces of plastic for food and eat them, entering the human food chain and threatening humans.

The Pacific Garbage Patch has been around for a long time. Due to ocean currents and other ocean movements, human garbage is gathered in a certain area, and its weight and area are increasing rapidly. Many media even call it the "eighth continent" on Earth.

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