abc 7 news reporter david louie got to board an aircraft at the moffatt field to learn about a big step towards cleanup. >> packed with surveillance equipment the c-130 provides very cramped work space for the team of 20. they have already been out once this week to count, measure and create imagery of the discarded fishing nets, buoys and other waste that has left a debris field stretching across the pacific. >> now that people are able to see it there and that it's also more than we expected really understand why it's so urgent to clean it up. >> reporter: until now the problem has been determining how much debris was needing to be pick up. a new radar system called lidar will help determining what needs to be picked up. >> we can see the 3-d objects and we can help convert the number of objects and also the estimated mass of these objects. >> reporter: you're looking at the sensors that are part of the lidar system. that's what helps the researchers create a 3-d image of the objects they are seeing on the ocean's suffer face. the 3-d images will be ready in a couple of months augment

> in blue of flowers moffatt's family asked that you make donations to st. mary's food bank, st. vincent de paul or hospice of the valley. >>> home invasion's are not unheard of. this next story about the man invading the home of a sleeping giant panda. >> the scene was captured by a camera focused on the giant panda enclosure in a zoo in an east china province. the panel was resting in the enclosure when a man jumped in, attempting to tease her. the panda wakes up, grabs the man by the leg and wrestles him to the ground. >> the zookeeper says the panda was looking to play and is a move similar to one made with breeders. left the zoo right afterwards. the panda was okay. folks, just let the panda be. >> he was taking a nap and relaxing. >> we're kind of the same way when we get -- when we wake up. [ laughing ]. >>> let's talk about the forecast. good news. after a stretch of record temperatures we're finally going to start to see temperatures trending down over the next few days. you can already te difference you step outside. we are running about 5 degrees

and abc 7 news reporter david louie spoke to people taking part in the project and he's live hat moffatt. hi, david. >> reporter: ama, until now the principal way researchers have determined how much plastic is out in the pacific is from observation from boats. the new area expedition will provide much greater detail as to how much plastic needs to be rounded up and taken to shore. the converted c-130 hercules dubbed ocean force 1 is back from one of two flights set for this week to do a low-speed, low altitude survey of the great ocean garbage patch, a huge debris field made up of discarded fishing nets and assorted plastic buoys and containers. about 1,000 miles off the california coast. >> it's worse than we thought, and, again, this underlines the urgency of why we need to clean it up. >> reporter: 22-year-old veteran and entrepreneur is behind a campaign to clean up 150 million pounds of trash. about half of a total in a decade. this week's mission will give his team a better sense of the value and waste of the waste using an imaging sense it called lidar. it's a system that helps r