A Summer’s Worth of Beach Debris Being Exiled Off-Island

Brianna Gibbs/KMXT
In June, work crews from Island Trails Network spent about two weeks in Halibut Bay collecting marine debris. The crew returned to Kodiak with the debris and finally had a chance to sort through the trash this past weekend. Tom Pogson is the in charge of marine programs, outreach and education for Island Trails Network and said members from the community came out on Friday, Saturday and Sunday to help sort the debris for shipment and recycling off island.
“On Friday we had members of the Coast Guard Marine Safety Detachment came and helped. And that was a huge help, three of them showed up," Pogson said. "And then on Saturday we had three members of Boy Scout Troop 626 and their Scout Master Steve Paulson, and that was a huge help.”

Pogson said the volunteers helped wrap up most of the sorting and he expects to ship the debris sometime this week.

— (Marine Debris 2 :42 “We’re done with all of the debris that had been collected that we didn’t have to way. And when I say we didn’t have to weigh it, the contributing set netters, we had a partnership with some set netters, the island trails network developed the contract so that we could compensate set netters for debris they picked up in their spare time and bring back to time and deliver to Gibson Cove. So those bags we’re going to weigh tomorrow cause we’re gonna have the hardware down there to actually pick the bags up and we have a big scale that we’re going to use to weigh their bags. And then we give each one them credit to the tune of 50 cents per pound. And that’s the only thing we haven’t done, there’s some buoys that probably could be bagged up but in terms of bags of marine debris, generic, all of the stuff mixed up in the yellow sacks, they’re all done.”)

Pogson said they don’t weigh all the debris until it ships, so the total poundage of trash collected from Halibut Bay should be known later this week when they put it in the container for shipment.

— (Marine Debris 3 :31 “We haven’t weighed the bags that we’ve collected to date. The emphasis was getting them sorted for recycling. But I’m just going to guess that there’s 45 bags, there’s probably a third of those that’s may be rope and line and those things are probably 300 pounds, plus because they’re pretty wet and dense. And then the plastics are probably 50 pounds and the foam bags are probably 40 pounds. I’m just going to make a wild guess, an average of 100 pounds, so maybe 4,500 pounds total. ”)

Marine debris clean up wasn’t the only project ITN worked on this summer. In fact Pogson will join the rest of the ITN crew, including founder and Director Andy Schroeder, for Talk of the Rock Tuesday. Tune in to KMXT at 12:30 p.m. to hear that conversation and learn about ITN’s busy summer and what to expect in the coming months.

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