Britain Braces For Rubber Duck Invasion, Toy Ducks Fell Overboard Cargo Ship 15 Years Ago
July 18, 2007 2:41 p.m. EST
Derek Kreindler - AHN Writer
Cornwall, England (AHN) - The first of some 29,000 rubber ducks that have been circling the world's oceans for 15 years are expected to wash up on a beach in England sometime soon.
The toys fell overboard from a cargo ship bound for Seattle from China in 1992, according to the BBC.
Their journey has given scientists a valuable insight into surface currents as they have been far more widely reported than the floating devices used be scientists.
"The ducks went around the North Pacific in three years - all the way from the spill site to Alaska, over to Japan and back to North America," said Curtis Ebbesmeyer, a retired oceanographer based in Seattle.
"This was twice as fast as the water at the surface - so
I began to call them hyper-ducks."
The rubber ducks are expected to wash up near Cornwall this summer, battered and bleached by their journey through the waters of the Arctic, as well as the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans.
The ducks have floated along the Alaskan coast, reaching the Bering Strait in 1995. It is thought they were trapped by slow moving ice for several years since it took them until 2000 to reach the Atlantic Ocean.
A year later, they were tracked in the area of the north Atlantic near the location of the wreck of the Titanic. Some broke away and headed for Europe, while others have surfaced in Hawaii, Indonesia, Australia and South America.
Two children's books have been written about the toys, which have become collectors' items, and can command up to $2000 on eBay.
Beachcombers can easily identify genuine rubber ducks, as they will have the words
"The First Years" stamped on them.
USA is invaded by tacos, England by rubber ducks ....
