SALON

Saturday, Dec 29, 2012 12:15 AM UTC

Wash. dock resembles one from Japan found in Ore.

By

Topics: From the Wires,

Wash. dock resembles one from Japan found in Ore.In this Dec. 21, 2012 file photo provided by the Washington Dept. of Fish & Wildlife, scientists inspect a dock that floated up on a remote stretch of wilderness beach in northwestern Washington. A scientist who examined the dock says it looks just like the one that came ashore on a central Oregon beach last summer, suggesting it also is a piece of tsunami debris from Japan. (AP Photo/Washington Dept. of Fish & Wildlife)(Credit: AP)

A scientist who examined the dock that recently washed ashore on Washington’s Olympic Peninsula says it looks just like the one that came ashore on a central Oregon beach last summer, suggesting it also is a piece of tsunami debris from Japan.

John Chapman, an assistant professor of fisheries at Oregon State University’s Hatfield Marine Science Center, said Friday the Washington dock found earlier this month has the same dimensions and configuration as the one found near Newport, Ore. The Oregon dock broke loose from a Japanese fishing port in 2011.

“It was identical so far as we could tell,” said Chapman, who was one of the eight people who hiked through old growth forest and crossed a rain-swollen creek on Dec. 21 to examine the dock. “It has the same set of cleats. It has the same rollers, the same shape, dimensions, the same bumper configuration.”

But there was no commemorative plaque on the dock found in Washington, like the one in Oregon had, to identify where it came from, he said. A stainless steel plaque identified it as one of four owned by Aomori Prefecture that broke loose form the port of Misawa during the March 2011 tsunami.

Efforts to trace and confirm the origin of the Washington dock have not yet been successful. The Coast Guard spotted it Dec. 18 on a remote stretch of wilderness beach on the northwestern tip of Washington protected by the Olympic National Park.

The Washington Ecology Department said nearly 30 species found on the dock have been identified, and none of them poses a high risk of becoming invasive.

Chapman said just the lower number of species and individual organisms on the Washington dock make it a far lower risk than the Oregon dock.

Also, the crashing surf on the Washington shore is not a hospitable habitat for species native to placid pot waters in Japan, experts say.

So far, there has been no sign any of the Japanese species on the Oregon dock has established in Oregon, Chapman said. However, there is no formal monitoring going on.

The Oregon dock measured 66 feet long, 19 feet wide and 7 feet high and weighed 165 tons before it was cut up and hauled away. Volunteers scraped off 2 tons of seaweed and creatures clinging to it and ran blowtorches over the surface to sterilize it.

Chapman said a flooded stream stopped them from their first attempt at reaching the Washington dock. But they returned the next day, wearing dry suits provided by the National Park Service, and were helped across by a search and rescue team. They used a rope to descend to the beach. The dry suits proved helpful on the beach, where they were dodging 16-foot waves.

“The dock was being pulverized on the rocks there,” Chapman said. Styrofoam was coming out where the concrete had fractured.

More By Jeff Barnard.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
    Credit: AP/LM Otero

  • Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center in Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
    Credit: AP/Matt Rourke

  • A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
    Credit: AP/Jenny Aicher

  • Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
    Credit: AP/Molly Riley

  • Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
    Credit: AP/J. Scott Applewhite

  • Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
    Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster

  • O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
    Credit: AP/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Jeff Scheid

  • Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
    Credit: AP/NASA/Chris Hadfield

  • When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
    Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin

  • A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
    Credit: AP/The Duluth News-Tribune/Clint Austin

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments

 0 Comments

Comment Preview

Your name will appear as username

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href=""> <b> <em> <strong> <i> <blockquote>

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

vote
Journalists file suit against Manning's trial secrecy: Plaintiffs including Glenn Greenwald and Julian Assange demand press, public access to trial and documents
133 points134 points | comment
vote
Report: Nearly a quarter of Americans struggle to afford food
118 points119 points | 12 comments
vote
Kaitlyn Hunt refuses plea offer, will go to court over high school relationship - The 18-year-old rejected a deal that would have labeled her a sex offender and placed her under house arrest
87 points88 points | 78 comments
vote
Kaitlyn Hunt refuses plea offer, will go to court over high school relationship - The 18-year-old rejected a deal that would have labeled her a sex offender and placed her under house arrest
82 points83 points | 18 comments
vote
Ted Cruz against the world - How the Junior Senator is igniting the GOP civil war
69 points70 points | 16 comments

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: Chekhov's story mirrors Russia's own

Recommendations