Marine Pollution
NOMAD and its staff and even customers help with formal and informal beach cleans along the Essex and Dorset coasts. These take place as part of one of our trips or as part of an organised, official beach clean at least twice a year. We collect everything and anything that shouldn't be on the beach and examples of the most conmmon refuse we collect are in order of quantity collected;
And the list does continue but the above are the most common. Some of the jetsam ends up on our beaches from the sewerage system i.e. tampon applicators (sort it out ladies!!). Toothbrushes, lighters tend to originate from shipping, both leisure and commercial and the rope and polystyrene and foam from boat boys and nets from fishermen. As for the balloons, well they originate from all over the UK and even Europe - fetes, schools, charity events, launches et cetera all need to realise that this crap ends up in our environment and very attractive to small marine animals and birds alike due to their bright colours. Numerous birds, turtles and other wildlife are killed every week due to these pesky little things.
The problem of balloons was recently highlighted on BBC TV (11th June 2008) so lets get a grip folks and use some common sense. Use balloons, they're pretty and a lot of fun but just dont let them go. Wait for the gas to leak out and then dispose of them through your re-cycling.
Cmon guys, we only have one planet so let try not to muck it up the way we do everything else! Lets make an effort!
