Critical lagoon clean-up and now a toxic nurdle disaster
Johnson called the day a critical clean-up and one of the worst incidence they have seen in a while
THE Clean Blue Lagoon (CBL) hosted a clean-up on Saturday honouring the passing of volunteer Samantha Deale.“CBL is nothing without the volunteers especially the regular ones,” said CBL organiser Dale Johnson. He said he fondly remembers being wowed by Deale and her group of friends at her first clean-up, so much so that he asked to take a picture of her and her friends for promotional work.
Also read:Residents show support for #CleanBlueLagoon
Johnson called the day a critical clean-up and one of the worst incidence they have seen in a while. Johnson said the toxic nurdles that spilled onto Durban’s beaches following the recent storm had been the main cause of the terrible state of Blue Lagoon and Beachwood Mangroves.
Also read:Durban beaches awash with toxic nurdles
Bart Fokkens said that the storm broke their litter booms which usually trap a mass of litter.
“We did 18 boat trips and moved about 900 bags from the North Bank to the South bank where they can be removed by the Municipal Authorities. It was a longer day than usual.An estimate of 450 bags had been collected during the week by temporary staff of DPAPP So the volunteers also collected some 450 bags. We estimated about 60 volunteers assisted in the clean up on Saturday,” added Fokkens.
According to Johnson approximately 900 bags of refuse was collected on Saturday. He credits the record number of bags collected to a combined effort by CBL volunteers and the Durban Partnership against Pollution (DPaPP).
To add to the usual litter that volunteers of the CBL initiative clean every three weeks was the severe nurdle spill from a container that was damaged during the durban storms earlier this month.
Both the nurdles and the toxins, once absorbed can enter the food chain as they are eaten by fish and other marine animals.Volunteer Anno Torr expressed dismay at the state of the blue lagoon saying, “Coming here is overwhelming and disheartening, this is only what we can see, it’s a joke to think we will even make a dent in this situation”Sonya Keyser added that “This is just a couple of square metres what about the rest of our coastline.”
Watch this video explaining how you can help make a difference in effectively and quickly remove these disastrous nurdles from our beaches:
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