E-Mail
Print
OLYMPIA, Wash. (Metro) -- Debris from the Japanese earthquake and tsunami is arriving on the Washington coast at a mind-boggling pace.
That's the conclusion of a new State Department of Ecology report on a pilot program to collect the debris.
According to peninsuladailynews.com, three six-member crews removed 70 pick-up loads of tsunami junk from beaches in three days last week.
Washington Conservation Corps crew member Jered Pomeroy says in the report they would clear a stretch of beach, only to have more debris wash up within 20 minutes.
Ecology WCC crews collected the debris along 57 miles of Washington shoreline, from Cape Disappointment on the Oregon border up to Moclips, in Grays Harbor County.
Debris included refrigerators, an oil drum, Styrofoam, pieces of plastic, large crates and containers, buoys, ropes and household garbage.
Ecology spokeswoman Linda Kent says it still is not known when, or if, the program will be extended to Olympic Peninsula beaches.
Once the results are in from the pilot program, and when the official report is approved from the interagency tsunami debris meeting that was held in May, decisions will be made on what happens next.
Copyright © 2012
Metro Networks Inc.
