Yeah but the pipe is all in one piece and is removed all in one go while these Garfield phones will keep showing up possibly forever

Well not any more, they go and recover the container and its remaining contents, the ones between the container and the beach will arrive and then no more phones.

From the article:

> The container remains inaccessible and it is not known how much of its cargo is sealed within it.

> In the meantime, both Ar Viltansou and local officials say they will continue to harvest Garfields from the coastline.

Fair enough. It's an engineering problem though right? I read 'inaccessible' as "it would cost too much to get to it" rather than "it's physically impossible to get to it."

Yes, but the pipe can go down and pollute the ocean for thousands of years until it's dissolved.