VOLUNTEERS have cleared more than 500 kilograms of marine debris from a beach near Portland with four tonnes of rubbish still to be removed.
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Some 52 people worked at the Discovery Bay Coastal Park after an overwhelming amount of plastic entangled in layers and ranging from large nets to micro sized fragments and nurdles were found scattered along 600 metres of shoreline.
Beach Patrol 3280-3284 volunteer Colleen Hughson said in her many years of cleaning beaches this was the biggest clean-up she had done.
"Just the sight of seeing so much was really horrific," she said.
"Some people were on their first beach clean and they were just astounded. They were blown away.
"That beach in particular, it does accumulate lots of rubbish, but on Saturday it was next level.
Ms Hughson said it would take weeks for the rubbish to be cleared and one of the positive things about cleaning a beach was the sense of accomplishment when it was done.
"When we do our clean ups we always walk away with a sense of achievement that we've left a clean beach," she said.
"It feels really good, but right from the get-go when we saw the sheer amount we knew we just have to do what we can but no way have we solved it.
"We're walking away and we're leaving four tonnes on the beach."
Ms Hughson said a lot of the science and policy around ocean debris maintained it came from land based sources.
"We've spent six-and-a-half years cleaning up our beaches every single week and what we get is all from the high seas," she said.
She said the volunteers called on the government to take urgent action to address the environmental crisis and the magnitude of the issue demanded resources beyond the capabilities of the volunteers alone.
"It's hard to believe in a first-world-country like ours a beach could look like it belongs in a developing country too poor to deal with rubbish," she said.
Volunteers in Saturday's clean-up included members from Beach Patrol 3280-3284, Stoked Surf Therapy, Dhauwurd-Wurrung Elderly and Community Health Services and staff from Victoria Fisheries Authority and Parks Victoria.
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