Message in a Bottle

(light jazzy music)

[Narrator] Last week, French artist, Brigitte Barthelemy,

was walking along southwest coast of France,

when she found a message in a bottle.

[Brigitte] I call my husband, Alan, Alan!

Come, come, come and see!

I found a bottle with message inside.

[Narrator] Inside, was a detailed drawing of a cormorant,

a type of seabird.

George Boorujy, an artist from New York City,

drew that cormorant back in 2013.

Then he rolled it up,

put it in a bottle, sealed it with wax,

then he hurled in into the Atlantic Ocean.

He was sending out an S.O.S.

But it wasn't because he needed rescuing.

It was, he hoped,

a message about the increasing

problem of trash in our oceans

and how it affects sea life, like cormorants.

His project is called New York Pelagic.

Over the years, he's thrown out over 20 bottles

and had about a third of them discovered.

Inside each bottle is a drawing of a different seabird,

with information about the project

plus a link to his website.

The bottle found in France has made big news there

and spurred a conversation about ocean pollution.

Not bad for a social media platform

that takes three years to reach its audience.