Given the recent discussion about where a derelict might drift in the Atlantic, here is an interesting news item from the Pacific. Four years after a 9.0-magnitude earthquake triggered a devastating tsunami which hit Japan and washed an estimated 5 million tons of debris into the ocean, a 25-30′ section of a Japanese commercial fishing vessel drifted into Oregon waters. Remarkably, in the hold were about 20 yellowtail jack, a fish usually found in the waters off Japan. The fish could have been caught and loaded aboard the boat before the tsunami, or they could have hatched from larvae that were aboard when the boat was set adrift.

The derelict section of what is believed to originally have been 50′ trawler was intercepted before it reached shore. In 2012 a much larger derelict made it all the way to shore when a 66 feet long, 165 tonne, starfish and barnacle encrusted, steel and concrete floating dock has washed up on Agate beach, south-west of Portland, Oregon.

Boat likely destroyed in 2011 Japanese tsunami turns up in Oregon with live fish still aboard