Surfers Against Sewage’s Annual spring beach clean goes down a storm!

Surfers Against Sewage (SAS) were joined by beach lovers at Lower Basin Road beach, Portslade on Sunday the 28th­­­­­­­­­­ of February, to clean up, in anticipation of spring, the tide line of trash that had gathered over long winter months.

The turnout for the beach clean event was absolutely amazing with 25 people of all ages showing just why SAS are campaigning so hard to protect the UK’s coastline.

The amount of litter collected around Hot Pipe and New Beach surf beaches is always both staggering and upsetting, with volunteers filling 41 bags, weighing in at 220kgs. The most worrying aspect is the fact that each year SAS are finding more litter at beaches around the UK, with plastics being the worst culprit.

The problems associated with plastics in the marine environment are reaching apocalyptic levels. A plastic bottle will take at least 450 years to break down and whilst this occurs will serve as a magnet for highly toxic chemicals.

Marine animals have been shown to mistake plastics for food and at least 100,000 marine mammals die of plastic entanglement or suffocation each year. With there being 1 piece of marine litter for every 48 square centimetres of beach in the UK and that fact that not a single beach on the entire planet is free of man made debris, the problem has surely reached a point that cannot be ignored.

SAS Rep, Aaron Jennings says; “Days like today always leave me with mixed emotions. On one hand it is so inspiring to see all the volunteers donating their time and passion towards caring for their beach, but on the other it is distressing to see the sheer volume of man made litter that’s impacting upon our oceans. The fact that this problem is getting worse adds to that feeling. However with grass roots action like beach cleans in conjunction with SAS campaigns such as our petition to Gordon Brown calling for the implementation of a National Marine litter Strategy, we can and will make a difference!”