VOLUNTEER POWER: Orca Month cleanup at Alki

| Environment | West Seattle news | West Seattle people

Alki’s a little cleaner after one hour of volunteer help today – thanks to Kersti Muul for the photos and report!

Today many groups are meeting at several beaches to help clean up for “An hour for the ocean” another event for Orca Month.

I worked with Whale Scout at Alki and we got 100 pounds of trash in one hour, in a small stretch near the bathhouse!

Beautiful day, beautiful people. We had a woman from Poland there, and one from Colombia helping, amazing!

More chances to clean up the beach are coming up this summer – including a Seal Sitters event two weeks from today!

Raye June 10, 2017 (6:51 pm)

Thanks, volunteers! The wildlife around Alki thanks you, too.

P.S. I just learned that plastic straws are very dangerous to marine animals and shorebirds. The animals can choke on them. So I’ll keep a lookout for those, too – and stick to paper straws!

Kersti Muul June 12, 2017 (8:57 am)

yes, thank you for noting this. The straws also get lodged in noses :(

if only marine animals had hands to help themselves out pf the predicaments we put them in

nw June 10, 2017 (7:50 pm)

Thanks for your service removing litter from the beach in a seattle park alki. The majority of storm water pollution in the form of litter however is along our city streets urban in dense areas where people live and work. When we have rain significant rain like we have had this past winter straws cigarette butts plastics basic litter all funnel into our storm drains those same storm drains curbside at your feet while you wait for the light to change so you can cross the street. Those storm drains all go directly into puget sound there is no filter catching all the litter on our sidewalks and streets litter along the gutter in front of bars and restaurants. That gutter with hundreds of cigarette butts that once we have a heavy rain the days after are gone. Litter collection needs to be collected along our city streets please do your part.

clinker June 11, 2017 (9:27 am)

Next time you go down to the beach for a walk, take a bag and just pick up any plastic bits you see. My kids like this game too, and it helps brighten our day. Yay for cleanup!

Howard Garrett June 11, 2017 (11:03 am)

Good work cleaning beaches!

Michelle June 11, 2017 (2:09 pm)

What a great event! I was amazed at how much we accomplished in just ONE HOUR!!! And with only a moderately sized group. If we all just do a little – the impact is huge! Thanks Whale Scout. :)

Rob B June 12, 2017 (6:43 pm)

There was also a beach cleanup yesterday hosted by “surfrider foundation.” There were maybe 30 volunteers up and down Alki. I don’t have the total garbage collected to report but I did hear multiple volunteers comment about how they didn’t have very heavy bags (a positive thought at the time but now I realize it’s due to the great work of other volunteers the day before!).

Good work all!

WSB June 12, 2017 (6:57 pm)

Didn’t get any calendar notification about that one, unfortunately, nor any postmortem. But we do have ample notification of the June 24th Seal Sitters’ cleanup, as linked above!

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