A Billion Pounds of Rotting Seafood...

There is a number in the newspaper this morning that if true is absolutely heart-boggling. The Seattle Times reported that there was “500,000 tons of rotting seafood in disabled refrigeration facilities” in the Tsunami ravaged region of Japan. That would be ONE BILLION pounds of rotting seafood. We toss around figures like millions, billions, and even trillions so often and easily these days I had to try to visual what ONE BILLION pounds of seafood might look like. If a million pounds can somehow be stacked up to make a pile one hundred feet tall then a billion pounds would make a pile nearly 19 miles high. Mount Everest is 5 ½ miles above sea level.
It’s hard to get my mind around what that must look like much less what it must smell like. In a sense it is simply one element of what Japan is dealing with as I write this. Reported in a simple sentence in the Seattle Times.