Comic or tragic? Marine biologists find fully functional USB stick in seal poop

Wellington, Feb 7: Dangers posed to the earth's marine life by piling up tons of plastic is not something new to learn. Scores of water lives are being lost because they consume the gigantic amount of plastic wastes that are gathering because of indifference of human beings.

Recently, a similar story of a marine animal devouring yet another electronic object and still surviving it has surprised a team of marine biologist Dr Krista Hupman at NIWA (National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research), Auckland, New Zealand. Dr Hupman and her team were researching leopard seal scat to ascertain their eating habits and health when they found a USB stick in it. And guess what, it was still functioning!

NIWA later tweeted a video stored in the stick seeking the owner of the stick found in the leopard seal's poop.

The story attracted quite a bit of attention, not only because the seal survived despite swallowing a USB stick but also because people were wondering which company made such high-quality USB that survived the stomach churning of the animal.

Hupman though was more concerned about the amount of plastic that sea animals are eating and the damage it is inflicting on the environment: "We are finding more and more marine mammals are ingesting plastic. This is just part of something that us humans have done to the environment," she said, according to a report in Storypick.

It's a perfect example of tragedy as well as comedy. Isn't it?