A civic-minded group, in Island Harbour, is paying a good deal of attention to protecting the beach, and one of the school buildings there, from ground-sea activity and quantities of seaweed.
The group of persons are making it their regular practice to clean the area and, up to Wednesday, this week, some of them were at work on the beach. They sometimes included a number of fishermen who, since the Covid-19 lockdown, were being encouraged to spend time cleaning the beach as they were unable to fish.
One of volunteers, Edmeade Smith (Pookie) was still there on Wednesday morning after the others had left. He was at the time replacing a quantity of stones which the recent ground-sea had displaced from near the eastern foundation of one of the buildings of the Vivien Vanterpool Primary School. “With no other work to do, I recently joined the group to clean the beach and to help protect the school and the children,” he said, as he laid the stones in place.
Looking out to sea, he stated that the edge of the water was originally well over fifty feet from the beach but, over the years, the sea had moved well into the land.
As a result, one of the school buildings is very close to the sea – about 6-8 feet – with an old concrete wall, filled with rubble, being the only barricade at the corner of the building. Further nearby erosion of the beach can seriously compromise the classroom structure.
The voluntary community group is doing a very good job and ought to be highly commended.
