The devastating tsunami triggered by the Tōhoku-Oki earthquake of 11 March 2011 caused a crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power station where it overtopped the seawall defences. On retreating, the tsunami carried loose debris and wreckage seaward and marshalled buoyant material into extensive plumes. Widespread concern over the fate of these and numerous other Tōhoku tsunami depositions prompted attempts to simulate debris dispersion throughout the wider Pacific. However, the effects of locally perturbed wind and wave fields, active Langmuir circulation and current-induced attrition determine a complex and poorly understood morphology for large floating agglomerations. Here we show that the early post-tsunami evolution of marine-debris plumes near Fukushima Daiichi was also shaped by near-surface wind modifications that took place above relatively calm (lower surface roughness) waters covered by surface films derived from oil and other contaminants. High-spatial-resolution satellite tracking reveals faster-than-expected floating-debris motions and invigorated plume evolution within these regions, while numerical modelling of turbulent air flow over the low-drag, film-covered surface predicts typically metre-per-second wind strengthening at centimetric heights, sufficient to explain the observed debris-speed increases. Wind restructuring probably stimulates the dispersion of flotsam from both biological and anthropogenic sources throughout a global ocean of highly variable surface roughness.

中文翻译：

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福岛第一核电站附近漂浮的海洋垃圾动力学和海啸后早期演化

通过T引发的灾难性海啸ō 2011年3月11合谷穴岐地震福岛第一核电站它比下去，海堤防御造成了危机。撤退时，海啸将松散的碎屑和残骸向海运送，并将浮力整理成大量的羽状流。在这些命运和许多其他牛逼的广泛关注ō北海海啸沉积促使人们尝试模拟整个太平洋地区的碎片散布。然而，局部扰动的风和波场，活跃的朗缪尔环流和电流引起的磨损的影响，决定了大型漂浮集聚体的复杂且鲜为人知的形态。在这里，我们表明，福岛第一核电站附近海屑羽流的海啸后早期演化也受到近地表风的影响，这种变化发生在相对平静（较低地表粗糙度）的水上方，水覆盖着由石油和其他污染物引起的地膜。高空间分辨率的卫星跟踪显示出这些区域内浮子运动快于预期，羽流演化更加活跃，而低阻力下湍流气流的数值模拟，覆盖薄膜的表面通常可以预测在厘米高度处每秒米的风速增强，足以解释观察到的碎片速度增加。风的重组可能会刺激漂浮物从生物和人为来源扩散到整个表面粗糙度高度变化的全球海洋中。