In the Caribbean, it does not matter what port you are pulling into or what anchorage area you use, there will be abandoned boats littering the shoreline or sunken nearby. South Carolina had neglected their waterways for years and the same situation existed. If you went to visit Hilton Head, Charleston, Georgetown, or Myrtle Beach you passed by abandoned boats littering their shoreline and waterways. Now after 510 boats being removed they have become the first warm weather state to accomplish this type cleaning of their coastal waters.
Rudy Socha, CEO and founder of Wounded Nature Working Veterans who started pushing this cleanup 7 years ago has learned what it takes to get this accomplished rather than just talked about. “We have removed and disposed of 315 of the 510 boats that have been removed from South Carolina’s coastal waters.
The key we have found is to get private companies, various state and local agencies along with politicians involved in the removal process. This limits the number of road blocks and obstacles each group will put up to get something meaningful accomplished.
Not only is it an eyesore but fiberglass abandoned boats is extremely bad for the marine environment. The average 30 ft sailboat represents 9,000 lbs of contaminants breaking down and contaminating the area where the boat resides. Fiberglass is composed of glass strands encapsulated in plastic and once these boats start breaking down they quickly contaminate shellfish in the area. These boats also contain fuel, oil, pressed wood and hundreds of pounds of personal belongings. For this reason, they cannot just be hauled out to deeper water and used as a reef.
“The hardest part of getting a total of over 500 boats removed has been obtaining funding. Second hardest part was to get everyone who could make a difference and help, to pay attention to the problem and get involved. This included both agencies and private companies. If we had been able to obtain private funding, the boat removals would have been accomplished years earlier”.
“We have been very fortunate for where we could not obtain funding we have been able to obtain in-kind donations in the form of labor and equipment allowing removals to take place. Unfortunately, a lack of funding always put us at risk of being able to stay afloat and substantially increases the timeline to get each boat removed. Many boat removals involved obtaining the services of more than one company and therefore we would have to wait until company A did their part before we could schedule company B to do their part.”
This is a huge environmental accomplishment that has resulted in removing over 5 million pounds of debris from the South Carolina’s coastal waterways.
This shows that it can be done and there is no longer a need to continue talking about debris removal and allowing abandoned boats to litter the beautiful Caribbean basin. The Caribbean is a beautiful place that tourists love to visit because of the beautiful waters, coral and sea life. It can and should be cleaned up. Wounded Nature – Working Veterans is currently looking for a primary sponsor or donation of 10 million dollars. This funding would not be used for advocacy or outreach, it would be spent on remedial action before any of these boats decompose any further.
If you want to find out who they are and what they have accomplished, you can visit their web site at woundednature.org
