Seafloor Litter in the Sinop İnceburun Coast in the Southern Black Sea

Abstract

In this study,
 abundance, distribution and type of seafloor litter were determined in the
 Sinop Inceburun coast which is the northeast point of Turkey. Study was carried
 out in October 2014 and proposed methods by Guidance on Monitoring of Marine
 Litter in European Seas’ published by European Marine Strategy Framework
 Directive Technical Subgroup on Marine Litter section of seafloor litter
 adopted the region. Seafloor litter density was found mean 808.74±215.02 pieces
 per km-2. The amount of litter was found maximum in 34 m depth. When
 results were evaluated in terms of the type of material plastic was found
 95.35% and encountered litter items were mainly composed of plastic bags. The
 size groups were found generally small than 50 cm x 50 cm in the classification
 according to the size groups. The data obtained from the study demonstrate that
 the seafloor in the region have highly littered compared to the other studies
 in the Black Sea. Marine litter pollution is a growing problem in the world all
 of the world’s oceans and also the Black Sea. Necessary measurements must be
 taken to solve this problem.