Plastic Catastrophe

OFS Plastic Catastrophe Project May 2025

 

OFS recently took action in response to a huge dumping of macro and micro plastic along the entire 5 kilometres of shoreline on Bherwerre Beach in Booderee National Park. Urgent action was taken by local volunteers and community groups who collected and removed the vast amount of plastic rubbish on this and other beaches. This catastrophe can happen again, in fact it is predicted to be a recurring event that will happen more frequently and could happen on many of the Shoalhaven’s famous 100 beaches. Swell, tides, and wind direction dictate where surges will occur.

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As a result we have established the Plastic Catastrophe Project.  (More details of the first event at Bherwerre Beach)

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Outline of OFS Plastic Catastrophe Project Plan

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OFS will support and promote Jervis Bay Free Dive's monthly beach clean-ups, inviting our supporters to join the Free Dive group. The clean-ups happen the 1st Sunday of every month. Monthly details of the target beach and meeting time get posted close to the event each month. Follow them on Facebook and Instagram!

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OFS Citizen Science Group will continue including Bherwerre Beach in its research work on microplastics.

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OFS will continue to be contactable about any plastic problems on our beaches and waterways. Simply email: ourfutureshoalhaven@gmail.com  Subject: Plastic Waste

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OFS will endeavour to get an emergency response from locals to urgently cleanup problematic dumps by using social media to recruit volunteers where necessary.

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OFS continues to promote the message to everyone:

• Always take spare rubbish bags to the beaches, rivers and creeks ... there is always something to pick up, every bit collected helps

• Pick up what you can

• Move rubbish you can't carry to higher ground so it can't re-enter the waters. Contact Council (1300293111) or National Parks and Wildlife Service (1800357823) to inform them if it needs to be removed.

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OFS recommends using the phone app SNAP SEND SOLVE.

 

This allows you to take a picture and send details to a centralized data site that distributes it to the appropriate authority/dept. immediately.  You will receive fast feedback about the progress of your report. It is an efficient way to report community issues (not just rubbish) e.g. dumped cars, rubbish on roadside, fallen trees, broken signage, pot holes and other hazards etc.

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Thank you for following OFS's projects, if you'd like to help with this particular project text Sue 0414 856 965 for more details.

 

Bherewerre Beach event

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This beach is the winter beach for endangered shorebirds and many others. This amount of plastic on the beach was tragic to see with juvenile birds and vital breeding pairs put further at risk. The plastic inundation was caused by an off shore storm surge. With intense effort the problem was solved, 30 sacks of plastic were removed by volunteers. OFS hopes to maintain the project since scientific evidence shows that there is a high risk of further events. In fact, it is predicted that events will be more frequent with even greater quantities of plastics likely to be dumped.

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OFS used social media to alert the community; we put a call out for volunteers to help get out on the beaches and pick up the deluge of plastic. Over 2 weeks 20 sacks of rubbish were picked up by individual volunteers, who also texted in pictures and news of other dumps of plastic. Caves Beach, Steamers Beach and Bherwerre Beach were reported plus other isolated places near storm water outlets.  In Week 3 of the cleanup, Jervis Bay Free Dive got their established group of regular beach cleanup volunteers organised to do a final blitz on Bherwerre Beach - 20 more bags later saw the job well done!

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OFS Citizen Science group , undertook a formal survey of plastic on Bherwerre Beach. Evidence showed that after the big clean-up effort the beach was back to normal with only very small amounts of micro plastics found.