So far, it has taken 137 man hours to clean the beaches further south.
Tons and tons of plastic and polystyrene washed to shore at Leisure Bay on the evening of last Wednesday.
Jenny Koen, chairman of Leisure Bay Conservancy said that three days prior to this, a ‘massive amount of rubbish floating on the water… massive chunks of polystyrene and plastics’ were spotted about halfway to Protea Bank reef.
The entire shoreline was affected; from the Tongasi River in the north to the Boboyi River in the south.
This waste landed on Glenmore South beach, Dassie beach, Kidds beach, Peter Pan beach, Drakes beach, T.O. beach – and all the rocky sections in between.
Koen said volunteers set to work, tide and heat permitting, and picked-up litter every day since last Thursday.
Koen said at Leisure Bay, they took four one-ton bakkie loads full to the Municipal Transfer Station, three of which filled the canopied bin to the top, and one was half full.
“There must have been 50 to 60 refuse bags full, plus the chunks of polystyrene too large to fit into bags. This in our area only,” she said.
To recap from north to south along the eastern coast, south of Scottburgh, Koen reported:
* Rocky Bay seems clear, just normal rubbish they are accustomed to.
* Pennington reports more or less normal bottles, etc, a bit more than normal, but not much polystyrene.
* Hibberdene is where the bad quantities start, all the way southwards past Port Edward.
* A remote area south of Port St Johns is also badly affected.
* The East London area is clear.
The bottom line is: We all need to ease up on our use of plastics; each one of us needs to be environmentally aware and spread the word. One person can make a difference. Refuse, reduce, re-use, recycle, repair, re-gift and recover. And especially, think and be aware.
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