Shooting guns is fun, but the “call the police” ritual isn’t as fun. This means that after the U.S. military has finished shooting, they line up at the firing range to pick up all the used casings they find. Task & Purpose has several articles on how much drag it can be for police to summon used brass at a shooting range or clean up base grounds in an early Earth Day celebration. But those tasks pale in comparison to what some sailors had to do earlier this month.
Add this to your list of isolated military installations you’ve never heard of. The island’s few inhabitants include shrubs, seabirds, island foxes, lizards, and the naval airfield San Nicolas Island. . Due to its isolation, the Navy owns the island, making it an ideal training and testing facility. But the island isn’t so isolated as to escape one of mankind’s most ubiquitous byproducts: garbage.
Earlier this month, nearly 50 sailors and civilians assigned to the Ventura County Naval Station and Naval Air Warfare Center Ordnance Division traveled to San Nicolas Island to remove more than 2,000 pounds of trash and debris from the island’s three beaches. .
According to a recent Navy press release, trash and debris included “World War II relics, clothing, commercial fishing gear (nets, buoys, traps, hooks) and boat accessories (timber, ladders, anchors). , bottles, plastic debris, tires, barrels, treated wood, toys and even shopping carts.”
Why did sailors and civilians spend all day picking up trash? Capt. Robert “Barr” Kimnak III, commander of Ventura County Naval Station, said this is part of his organization’s tradition.
“NBVC has a long tradition of engagement programs that promote community service, protect the environment, while increasing public awareness and understanding of the U.S. Navy,” he said in a press release.
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The tradition is especially important on San Nicolas Island, home to the endangered small shorebirds called plovers. Northern elephant seals, which are protected under the Marine Mammal Protection Act, also visit the island’s beaches in winter, according to a press release. Litter can threaten both species.
“We have eliminated numerous sources of microplastics,” said Keith “Fudge” Buckingham, Cmdr. San Nicolas Island Responsible Officer, in a press release. “Fishing nets, clothing, plastic bottles, etc., decompose when exposed to water and sunlight, producing harmful micro-plastics that are ingested by local marine life.”
All in all, picking up tons of trash to save endangered and protected species might not be the worst way to spend your day. But the fact that so much waste ends up on an isolated rock is a thorny problem in itself.
Bill Heuer, Natural Resources Manager at Naval Station Ventura County, said in a press release: “If the Navy can collect an average of 4,000 pounds of trash (two beach cleanups each year) on California’s most remote islands, then we know there is too much trash in the ocean.”
Heuer is right. According to the Pew Charitable Trust, about 11 million tons of plastic waste enter the ocean each year. Because plastic doesn’t decompose, all the trash either floats to the surface or sinks to the bottom, where it often kills marine animals that eat or get entangled in it. This is not a problem that can be solved by a few disgruntled enlisted men alone. Still, don’t give the commander an idea.
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