ORLANDO, Fla. – Alex Schulze has collected plenty of cell phones from the ocean, but only one has turned on.
“Most of the time, the [phones] are basically locked up or the salt water has kind of destroyed them,” Schulze said.
Schulze is the co-founder and CEO of ocean cleanup company 4ocean and was recently looking for trash in the Boca Raton Inlet in South Florida when he came across an iPhone in a clear waterproof case on the sand.
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“It appeared to be in great shape. I brought it back to our office where I was able to charge it and then looked at the emergency contacts on the lock screen,” Schulze told Matt Austin and Ginger Gadsden during a conversation on Florida’s Fourth Estate.
That’s when Schulze said he called the emergency contact number labeled “Mom”.
“The woman answered and said ‘oh my god I can’t believe you found my son’s phone,’” he said.
Turns out, her son lost his iPhone a few days prior.
Schulze said the woman traveled to the 4ocean office and happily retrieved her son’s iPhone.
The discovery and happy ending make for a great story, but sadly the plight of Florida’s polluted water is not over.
4ocean employs captains and crews worldwide who have now removed over 30 million pounds of trash from the ocean.
The company transforms the collected plastic into products like bracelets and sells those products to fund more cleanups.
Florida’s Fourth Estate learned more about the most common and most shocking items found by the 4ocean team during cleanup dives.
“The most common thing we find is single-use plastics,” Schulze said.
Those include plastic bottles, chip bags and multi-layer packaging.
When it comes to the craziest thing he’s found, Schulze says it’s not pirate treasure or a pallet of smuggled cocaine.
“I’d have to say our crews have actually come across a few dead bodies. It’s been pretty heavy,” Schulze said.
You can listen to Schulze’s full conversation about his ocean floor discoveries, his path to co-founding 4ocean and how others can make a positive impact in their environment on Florida’s Fourth Estate.
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