Plastic bottle raft crosses Pacific

Two men who crossed the Pacific on a raft made of 15,000 plastic bottles stepped onto dry land today after three months at sea.

Friends greeted Marcus Eriksen and Joel Paschal in Hawaii with fresh food and beer to celebrate the end of their 2,600-mile voyage to highlight the problem of ocean debris.

The pair left Long Beach, California, on June 1. Their 30-foot vessel had a deck of salvaged yacht masts, six pontoons filled with plastic bottles and a cabin made from the fuselage of a Cessna aeroplane.

While at sea they realised they were only travelling half a mile per hour and it would take them much longer to reach Hawaii than the previously anticipated six weeks.

“We had to go to half rations for awhile,” said Mr Paschal, 32.

Without a backup plan, the two used a satellite phone to get in touch with Roz Savage, who was crossing the Pacific solo in a rowboat and happened to be in the same area.

Ms Savage, who was heading from San Francisco to Hawaii, was in dire need of water after both her potable water makers broke. When the three met up the men gave her a water maker and she gave them some of her extra food.

Food was not the only problem the men encountered on their trip. The raft, which can only sail down wind, had a hard time leaving the Long Beach area, encountering storms that tore it apart during the first two weeks. Some of the bottles that were supposed to help the raft stay afloat started to sink.

Mr Eriksen’s fiancee Anna Cummins said the goal of the trip was to raise awareness about plastic debris and pollution in the ocean.