IF YOU fancy a pair of Nike basketball shoes, thousands of pairs are up for grabs along the beaches from Washington state to Alaska. This after three 40-foot containers carrying an estimated 5 500 pairs of shoes were lost from a container ship in Northern California in December. Finding a pair may however be a bit of a battle since Nike forgot to tie the laces. But Dr Curtis Ebbesmeyer, an oceanographer who tracks sneakers, toys and other flotsam across the sea, says it’s worth the effort since all 33 000 are wearable. According to the Cargoweb newsletter, a beachcomber told Ebbesmeyer about the shoe spill after finding two new blue-and-white men’s shoes washed up on Washington’s Olympic Peninsula in January.
