Durban -
Mounds of litter has washed up at the Bluff Yacht Club after the recent rain, disgusting boat owners and alarming the Transnet National Port Authority.
The litter that covered the mangrove swamps on Sunday was cleaned up by the port authority with the help of the municipality yesterday.
The Bluff Ratepayers’ Association and the yacht club say the rubbish comes down the canals and flows into the harbour and that they have inadequate protective booms or mechanisms to trap it.
The association’s chairman, Ivor Aylward, said he had been in contact with the municipality regarding the malfunctioning weirs in the Amanzimnyama Canal.
“It is full of litter. The workers tasked to clean it have no safety harnesses or a safe system to clean it. There is also oil in the water,” he said.
Aylward said the source of the pollution needed to be traced. He believed businesses along the canal were using it for dumping.
While inspecting one of the canals, Aylward came across a space under a bridge pillar occupied by vagrants. A source said more than 20 people used the underground space under the M7 freeway. Litter was stacked up inside.
Transnet National Port Authority’s spokeswoman, Jozi Meth, said the authority was grappling with the challenge of dealing with the large volume of waste and effluent discharged into the port through stormwater drains. “This is particularly bad after heavy rain such as that experienced on Saturday evening.”
Meth said the authority’s environmental management department, with the Department of Environmental Affairs and the eThekwini Municipality, had developed an Estuarine Management Plan for the port to address the environmental stress.
This included waste management in the catchment area. The Minister of Environmental Affairs recently gazetted the draft Estuarine Management Plan for comment.
“The combined catchment area of the rivers, canals and stormwater drainage systems that drain into the port is more than 200km2 and the port essentially receives waste and effluent that is discharged into stormwater drains from as far afield as Assagay. This is not only aesthetically displeasing, but also affects port users, marine and bird life and can pose a significant risk to port operations,” Meth said.
Meth said on Sunday the municipality’s Pollution Control Department installed a boom between the Bluff Yacht Club and the Amanzimnyama Canal to assist with catchment of the existing debris from the canal.
“The city’s pollution control department was involved in a clean-up operation yesterday,” she said.
eThekwini municipality had not replied to questions at the time of publication.
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