美国国家公共电台 NPR Teenage Diver Finds Tons Of Golf Balls Rotting Off California

 

MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:

Divers¹ in California have stumbled on an unexpected source of plastic waste in the ocean - golf balls that come from coastal² golf courses. Golf balls contain plastic and can emit toxic³ chemicals. And as NPR's Christopher Joyce reports, there are lots of them underwater, something discovered by a 16-year-old diver named Alex Weber.

ALEX WEBER: My dad - he raised me underwater.

CHRISTOPHER JOYCE, BYLINE⁴: Alex Weber is a free diver. She just holds her breath. In 2016 near Carmel, Calif., she and her father were diving in the Pacific just offshore⁵ from a golf course. She looks down and saw something weird⁶.

WEBER: You couldn't see the sand. It was completely white.

JOYCE: Golf balls.

WEBER: You look down, and you're like, what are you doing here?

JOYCE: Thousands of golf balls.

WEBER: It felt like a shot to the heart.

JOYCE: She was offended. She decided⁷ she'd haul them up. She put them in her family's garage.

WEBER: I had all of these golf balls in my garage, and they stunk⁸. And I had no idea why.

JOYCE: Then she heard about a scientist who studied plastic waste in the ocean. His name was Matt Savoca from Stanford University. She emailed him. He came to look at her collection.

WEBER: Fifty thousand golf balls just sitting in the garage. He said I should write a paper about this. And I was like, Matt, I'm 16 years old. I don't know how to write a scientific paper.

JOYCE: He said he'd help. That meant diving with her - not easy.

MATT SAVOCA: The oceans off California are actually quite cold, and so you suit up in a pretty thick wet suit. It's incredibly physically⁹ demanding.

JOYCE: They took kayaks out to ferry the golf balls back.

WEBER: We'll have the kayaks so filled with plastic that we'll end up just having to tow the kayaks back, and we'll have to swim it to shore.

SAVOCA: While we were out there, we would hear plink, plink, and then we'd look up on the hill, and there would be golf balls flying in off the course right into the ocean where we were doing some collections actually.

WEBER: Whenever we have good conditions, we're able to pull out between about, like, 500 to 5,000 golf balls.

JOYCE: Over two years, they found more than 50,000 golf balls. The source - five golf courses. Three were up the Carmel River. The golf balls just rolled under water down to the ocean. In the journal Marine¹⁰ Pollution Bulletin, the team says chemicals from 50,000 or so golf balls will probably only have a small effect on the ocean, but they do degrade into microplastic pieces that marine animals could eat. Alex Weber says if those golf balls floated, people would be shocked.

WEBER: If a person could see what we see underwater, it would not be acceptable.

JOYCE: Christopher Joyce, NPR News.

1 divers   

adj.不同的；种种的

参考例句：

• He chose divers of them,who were asked to accompany him.他选择他们当中的几个人，要他们和他作伴。
• Two divers work together while a standby diver remains on the surface.两名潜水员协同工作，同时有一名候补潜水员留在水面上。

2 coastal   

adj.海岸的，沿海的，沿岸的

参考例句：

• The ocean waves are slowly eating away the coastal rocks.大海的波浪慢慢地侵蚀着岸边的岩石。
• This country will fortify the coastal areas.该国将加强沿海地区的防御。

3 toxic   

adj.有毒的，因中毒引起的

参考例句：

• The factory had accidentally released a quantity of toxic waste into the sea.这家工厂意外泄漏大量有毒废物到海中。
• There is a risk that toxic chemicals might be blasted into the atmosphere.爆炸后有毒化学物质可能会进入大气层。

4 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

5 offshore   

adj.海面的，吹向海面的；adv.向海面

参考例句：

• A big program of oil exploration has begun offshore.一个大规模的石油勘探计划正在近海展开。
• A gentle current carried them slowly offshore.和缓的潮流慢慢地把他们带离了海岸。

6 weird   

adj.古怪的，离奇的；怪诞的，神秘而可怕的

参考例句：

• From his weird behaviour,he seems a bit of an oddity.从他不寻常的行为看来，他好像有点怪。
• His weird clothes really gas me.他的怪衣裳简直笑死人。

7 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

8 stunk   

v.散发出恶臭( stink的过去分词 )；发臭味；名声臭；糟透

参考例句：

• Those rotten eggs have stunk the place. 那些臭蛋把这个地方弄得恶臭。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》
• A stunk made a bad smell in our yard last night. 昨天臭鼬在我们院子里弄得好臭。 来自互联网

9 physically   

adj.物质上，体格上，身体上，按自然规律

参考例句：

• He was out of sorts physically,as well as disordered mentally.他浑身不舒服，心绪也很乱。
• Every time I think about it I feel physically sick.一想起那件事我就感到极恶心。

10 marine   

adj.海的；海生的；航海的；海事的；n.水兵

参考例句：

• Marine creatures are those which live in the sea. 海洋生物是生存在海里的生物。
• When the war broke out,he volunteered for the Marine Corps.战争爆发时，他自愿参加了海军陆战队。