Vancouver Island marine debris heading to Delta

DELTA (NEWS 1130) — You may find some hidden treasure along the Fraser River next weekend, all thanks to our neighbours across the Pacific.

The cargo from a massive, Japanese-funded marine debris recovery along Vancouver Island’s shores is scheduled to arrive in Delta Monday afternoon.

Most of the over 40 tons of debris, plastics, and rubble will go to recycling.

“A great deal of it can go in to the recycling stream and that is really why we brought it down here,” Living Oceans Society’s Karen Wristen tells NEWS 1130.

The marine preservation group’s executive director says you can help sort the cargo and search for hidden treasures with an event October 1st and 2nd.

“We’ve always taken some of the brighter coloured buoys and made jack-o-lanterns and planters and things out of them and people always fined useful things among the plastic debris that we collect,” Wristen says.

The funding for the cleanup effort is a gift from Japan after the 2011 earthquake and tsunami which propelled rubble and wreckage towards Canada’s west coast.

“It’s critical that we get this plastic off the beaches before it breaks down into bitesize pieces and ends up in the food chain and ultimately on our dinner plates. It’s pretty clear now that creatures as small as plankton are taking up micro plastics out of the water.”

Living Oceans Society is touting this as the largest ever marine debris recovery of its kind in Canada involving over 100 volunteers with Clear The Coast.

Wristen says people usually find interesting things, sometimes little treasures, in ocean clean-up efforts.

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