On 13 February 1997 a huge wave hit the container ship Tokio Express about 20 miles off Land's End, and 62 containers went overboard. One of them held 4,756,940 Lego pieces, many of them sea-themed: dragons, octopuses, life rings, flippers and spear guns. About half of them float. This is a drift simulation of the floating half over five years: 240,000 virtual pieces, each standing for 10 real ones, drift with the daily surface current plus 0.5 to 2% of the wind, and pieces that reach the shore can be washed off again. Time speeds up as the video runs. The spill position was never published, so it is estimated: of four positions tested about 20 nautical miles off Land's End, the one west of Land's End is the only one that sends pieces to both the north and south coasts of Cornwall, where the real pieces turned up.
Source: Currents: E.U. Copernicus Marine Service, North-West Shelf reanalysis (NWSHELF_MULTIYEAR_PHY_004_009) at 7 km. Winds: Copernicus satellite winds (WIND_GLO_PHY_L4_MY_012_006). Piece counts: Lego Lost at Sea. Drift computed by The Moving Sea
Free for personal and educational use with credit to The Moving Sea. For commercial use, contact [email protected].