Ocean Rafting is proud to have facilitated a forth local beach clean with Parley for our Oceans amongst the Whitsunday Islands. The weather cleared, and the wind eased allowing us to explore some of the more remote beaches on the south-east side of Whitsunday Island. Some of the beaches are so untouched by humans they don’t even have names but are so polluted that we could see the colours of the litter from afar. It reinforces what we know: this marine debris washes up through ocean currents and the characteristics of the items found indicate that a majority comes from fishing boats, cargo ships and foreign countries.
It is important to note that of the 6 beaches visited, only 3 of them had significant issues with pollution. The Whitsundays generally is a very clean region but beaches rarely accessed that face the prevailing wind conditions can be localised hot spots for marine debris. This stresses the importance of environmental initiatives and we are proud to work alongside organisations such as Parley to ensure our coastline remains clean.
“Complying with group size limitations at the time of the cleanup and social distancing guidelines, our team was small but none the less dedicated and tireless: in one day and across five sites, 8 of us recovered 361kg of rope, hard plastic, PET, toothbrushes and other household items. Well aware that plastic can exist in the environment for hundreds of years until broken down to plastic dust, our crew returned back to the mainland feeling accomplished and happy to know that this 361kg cannot do any harm to our beaches and oceans anymore.” – Parley Australia
