Every day, a 8 million bits of plastic enters the world oceans. Most of it goes on to degrade in the sea for many years, but some ends up being washed on to shore again. For ten years, volunteers along the coast to the east of Brighton have been fighting this and turn out every month to pick up the rubbish that covers the area.
In the decade that the volunteers have been working this stretch of coast, the plastic that they find has changed.
Plastic straws and the like have reduced, due to social changes thanks to Blue Planet. However, waste from the fishing industry is often found. Whilst there are a number of fishing harbour's nearby, the detritus originates far from the area, with bouys being found from Devon, some 200 miles away.
The majority of this fishing waste is too small to be traced however, and appears as 'fisherman's kisses' - ends of netting which are cut and discarded.
The volunteers that turn up every month are a strongly knitted community that come from the surrounding towns and villages. Some of them have moved away, yet come back to fight the endless amount of plastic on the beaches.
The plastic the volunteers find is often very well embedded in the landscape. In a survey, 40% of seabirds were found to be contaminated by marine plastic waste. Every single turtle in the same survey was found to have ingested plastic in some form.
In many cases, nature has started to adapt to the amount of human waste in the sea.
The area that the volunteers work falls within the region controlled by the Souther Water utility company. Southern Water have consistently been found to be the bottom of the list of Water Boards for water safety.
They were recently issued with a £126,000,000 fine for attempting to hide the fact they were dumping waste into the sea without public knowledge in 2019. The area is home to Brighton and Hove beach, and one of the most used sea bathing sites in the country.
Despite the fine, various evidence can be found on the beach that suggests that Southern Water is still dumping sewage in the sea without notifying the public.
It is then weighed and recorded. This year, the group has collected 1 metric tonne of waste. It is the first time they have managed to collect such a large amount. This is despite multiple clearances being cancelled because of the COVID crisis.
The problem is not going away, and probably getting worse.
But every month, the volunteers of Sussex will plan to fight back against the mark that humans are leaving in the Earth's oceans.
The group are members of the Deans Beach and Environment Volunteers
All quotes have been paraphrased.
All photos by Tolly Robinson
Credits:
Tolly Robinson