Full body burial at sea - ok by the EPA

There is a silence where hath been no sound

There is a silence where no sound may be

In the cold grave, under the deep deep sea

-excerpt from "Silence" by Thomas Hood

I was yesterday years old when I learned that it's completely legal and free (if you're resourceful) to be buried at sea. Not just having your ashes spread. Actually dumped into the water and sunk to the bottom of the ocean. I choose the word "dumped" not be be insensitive, but because the the EPA regulations for this are part of the "ocean dumping" section of their website. https://www.epa.gov/ocean-dumping/burial-sea#instructions

You must do the following things:

1. Be wrapped in a biodegradable shroud with weights, or in a coffin that is prepared to meet specific requirements.

2. Not have received chemotherapy or contain medical waste

3. Be sunk is water more than 3 miles off shore and greater than 600 feet deep.

4. Someone must report it on the EPA website within 30 days. No prior permit is required.

I eat meat have always loved the idea that my remains could be eaten by animals, somehow restoring justice for my many many (animal) murders and completing a cycle of life more directly than turning into fertilizer. It seemed like this would not be possible and I would settle for cremation like everyone else that doesn't want to buy a cemetery plot and continue to pay rent post-mortem. What kind of sick joke is that actually? Being eaten by crabs, fish, and even sea worms sounds wonderful to me.

This seems like a really interesting way to go directly back to nature and not take up any additional resources. A half-day trip on a fairly efficient diesel boat would do the trick. From Berkeley it's 43 miles to the shelf past the Falleron islands. You can see them from Ocean Beach on a clear day. From Santa Cruz it's a mere 10 miles to the Monterey Canyon.

I have some questions though.

First, what happens to a body on the floor of the deep ocean? In my part of California, the ocean floor goes quickly to around 300 ft deep and then stays that depth for quite a ways, then there is a line where it drops off to over 1000ft and quickly becomes many times deeper than that. Unfathomably deep. So..... what kind of life is down there? Are there fish and crabs that will eat me? Or will I be preserved in an oxygen depleted environment like a mummy? If my desire is to return to nature, how do I feel about the possibility of my physical form spending all of eternity frozen in time in the pitch black darkness under the crushing weight of 3000 feet of water? Symbolically, it is cold and lonely.

Second, what are the logistics of moving a dead body? There might be some tricky steps to getting a body released to an individual instead of a funeral home. If you can even get the hospital to release the body, how do you keep it from getting awful on the ride to the boat and out to the spot? I'm guessing dry ice. You can't include plastics in the shroud, so most fluid-catching solutions are a no go.

If this sounds like a lot to ask your grief stricken relatives to deal with, there are boat charters all over that will handle it all for you. The cost starts around $5000. Here is a company that does this out of Santa Cruz https://seaspiritmemorial.com/full-body-burial/

Your family and friends can save the GPS coordinates in case they would like the visit your grave site. How's the for a fuck you to the funeral industrial complex?