Word Environment Day: A look at organisations in Visakhapatnam striving to protect the planet

Ahead of World Environment Day, a look at three organisations in Andhra Pradesh that are striving to protect the planet

Looking at the endless glistening azure waters off Rushikonda Coast, professional scuba diver Subhash Chandra never had an inkling of what awaited him when he went for swim on a clear day in 2019. He wasn’t greeted to a world of marine wonders as he had imagined. Instead, his legs repeatedly got entangled in plastic wastes, discarded cloth and ghost nets.

To assess the underwater situation, Subhash along with a friend went free diving near the coast and were that’s when reality dawned on him. “I was aghast to see the situation. The filth beneath the blue waters was shocking! We saw 100 metres of garbage settled on the sea bed” says Subhash, founder of a scuba-diving institute Platypus Escapes. After two hours, they ended up pulling out 400 kilograms of trash and eventually collecting 7,000 kilograms of underwater waste in the next few days. Their efforts were acknowledged by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his Sunday’s Mann Ki Baat.

That was the beginning of the humongous task of ocean cleanup, which Subhash embarked upon along with his team and a growing number of volunteers who joined hands with him. Since then, they have completed 88 ocean cleanups and cleared 53,000 kilograms of garbage from the seabed.

On June 8 on the occasion of World Ocean Day, Subhash is planning his biggest ocean cleanup event at Rushikonda. Around 60 trained volunteers will be a part of the event that is expected to see participation from people from all walks of life. “These volunteers have gone through a 10-day ocean swimming training and are adept at assisting the others for the ocean clean-up. We will be clearing trash up to three feet deep of water, which is comfortable even for non-swimmers,” says Subhash. The trash will be collected in a floater mesh bag designed by the team of Platypus Escapes and can hold up to 250 kilograms of garbage.

A report by NASA’s Earth Observatory highlighted that ‘about eight million tons of plastic flow from rivers and beaches into the ocean every year’. These plastics are carried by ocean currents and broken down by waves and sunlight into small microplastics that are now part of the floating plankton – the base of the food web in the ocean, the report further added. “At Rushikonda, the plastic pollution has deeply affected the corals. In the past four years, the underwater ecosystem has been disturbed to a large extent,” says Subhash.

(To register for the ocean cleanup event, call 7622893711)

From tackling electronic wastes to recycling temple flower waste and marine waste, Greenwaves Environmental Solutions has been working towards making peace with Nature through their sustainable products.