100 Days Clean Up – Day 86 Update

It’s day 86 and the past 11 days have been very heavy. We are proud to announce that we reached another milestone in our fight against marine debris: 750.8 kg.

During the last 11 days our Diveteam and the guests did some heavy work. An average of 19.3 kg was picked up during each dive. Day 84 and day 77 were the heaviest amongst them all with 29.6kg and 29.5kg. Most of the weight was actually construction material like a lot of metals and lumber pieces. On one dive we found a whole burlap bag full of lumber, 128 pieces in total. That sums up to a lot of kilos carelessly thrown overboard.  The list of curiosities is of course again very long. The motor of a blender, a car mirror, cellphone batteries, countless pieces of floor mats, many flags and a cassette are just some examples amongst them.  It also seems that someone threw a whole set of game cards away. We fish out one or two almost on a daily base.

Approaching the end of our project fast there is still no end to our usual suspects: plastics, cans and glass. While not found exclusively anymore the amount is still shocking. On day 76 we fished out 134 food wrappers and plastic fragments in two dives. It’s been more difficult to locate the smaller pieces; most of them hide under a layer of sand. Now instead of spotting plastics everywhere we find nests. We called them like that because finding one means removing a lot of plastics and cans from a small gap between the corals.

For the remaining 13 days we hope to finally find something useful :D We reached more than we could hope for already and are now awaiting the big final. Who knows what is possible over the next days.

Written by Brigitte Zintz (PADI Staff Instructor Seaventures Dive Rig) – initiator of Project AWARE 100 Days Clean up Project