Beachcombing To Save The Planet
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The plan was to take a long walk on a beautiful Oahu beach near Sherwoods (Waimanalo) - a healthy way to de-stress. But that fateful stroll in 2005 transformed the lives of Suzanne Frazer and Dean Otsuki forever. And if you mention the key word “plastic” to them, prepare for an earful of sobering facts.
“Twenty minutes into our walk, there’s marine debris right in our faces,” recalls Frazer, an Australia native who came here to study dance at UH-Manoa. “We saw what looked like a laundry basket full of stuff - the whole beach was littered. We could see it coming on the waves.”
Like the waves, they returned every day for months, armed with garbage bags to remove the debris, which was mostly plastic. No more leisurely walks. And the more they followed plastic’s toxic trail, the heavier the burden grew.
“When I got all that knowledge, it gave me a responsibility to tell others about it,” explains Otsuki, 48, a graphic designer and avid surfer originally from Monterey. “It’s a huge problem. I used to be a seafood eater; not anymore. (It’s like) we’re eating our own garbage now.”
In 2006 they founded Beach Environmental Awareness Campaign Hawaii - a full-time, unpaid passion for them both. So far they’ve taken their message to 37 schools, 142 out-reach events and 100 beach cleanups - not counting their own weekly collections of “millions” of tiny polluters all over the state. Their third book of beach data comes out soon, and they plan a Marine Debris Awareness Student Art Project display March 18 to April 28 at the state capitol.
As others step up to scour the more popular beaches, Otsuki and Frazer now focus on remote spots, such as a dirty stretch of shoreline in Kahuku. Difficult to access, it bears the brunt of the manmade mess brought in by Windward wave action.
The plastic scourge is everywhere and growing worse, they say. Not only does it harm seabirds and marine life, its hormone-like chemicals may harm humans too. Studies indicate chemicals from plastic can remodel human cells and tissue during key stages of development, in the womb and in early childhood (Discovery magazine).
“It’s so important, so disastrous,” says Frazer, 44. She explains with a metaphor: “In a flood, you just get the sandbags and work to get things done. We’re trying to stop the flood, put out the fire.”
One handy weapon in their war is the sand sifter, which you can order from their website (b-e-a-c-h.org). In 30 minutes, Otsuki claims, it can fill a 5-gallon bucket with beach trash.
Back at B.E.A.C.H. headquarters in their Hawaii Kai home, the urgent work continues. Otsuki is the nuts and bolts of the organization, maintaining the website, donating money, designing fliers and setting up for their many events. Frazer is spokeswoman and chief educator. “Dean’s the tech person; I do the creative part,” she says.
You might say they are the perfect team. In fact, they discovered that for themselves and in 2008 got married - on Lanikai Beach, of course. They planned to spend their third anniversary, Jan. 16, at a Kahuku cleanup. “Maybe we’ll go to the beach and relax after that,” Otsuki mused prior to the date.
Their work is being recognized across the globe, most recently by the Swedish manufacturer of Electrolux vacuum cleaners. It campaigned for a greener planet last year by creating five prototype vacuums using shoreline plastics from the Mediterranean, the North and Baltic seas, Indian Ocean, and the Pacific. Among the selected gatherers was B.E.A.C.H., which did six hunts in Hawaii last summer for Electrolux with help from hundreds of volunteers - among them 400 Mililani Middle School science students who sorted through thousands of particles to find the tiny-sized bits and pieces the project required. The harvest shipped off for Hawaii’s model vacuum was mostly blue and white, Frazer says, because marine life had likely consumed the more colorful trash before it reached shore.
(Electrolux hopes to eventually build vacuums entirely from recycled plastic instead of the current 70 percent: “Oceans are full of plastic waste, yet on land there’s a shortage of recycled plastic for producing sustainable vacuums.”)
Frazer doesn’t have much time to vacuum, but her enthusiasm and detailed classroom talks apparently have struck a chord with students and teachers. Habits are changing, says Mililani Middle teacher Jake Tamaye.
“They were very excited when B.E.A.C.H. came,” he recalls, noting Frazer and Otsuki’s infectious passion for the work. “The kids didn’t know the dangers of plastics. None of us would have thought of trash as being dangerous. Suzanne spread out the debris on the tables and made them wear gloves.”
His eighth-graders are more aware of marine debris now, especially plastic. Some are making a conscious effort to avoid it, and they feel good about making a difference. “Personally I’m also a little disturbed (about plastic’s toxic effects),” Tamaye adds. “At home we’ve changed all our dishes to Pyrex.”
Vacuum cleaners are just a footnote to B.E.A.C.H.‘s awareness crusade. Frazer also arranged a retrieval system for plastic caps and lids - what one might toss out while saving containers to recycle. Goodwill stores at Mapunapuna, Beretania, Kapahulu and Wahiawa now accept them, and Matson ships it all to Lucent Polymers for free. Look for caps and lids with the symbol 2 (HPPE), 4 (LDPE) or 5 (PP).
The brightly colored caps, you see, fool seabirds and kill their young, Frazer shares at workshops. The birds think they’ve picked up squid or fish eggs to take back to the nest. The chicks gratefully gulp it all down. Then, as the plastic accumulates in their gut, they die of starvation, blockages, dehydration and lacerations. Frazer also frets about plastic pellets in Airsoft BB guns. “Kids shoot them, about 16,000 per person per game. Then they leave them as litter, and they wash to sea. Plastic breaks down, but it never biode-grades, never goes away.”
Goals for 2011 include getting B.E.A.C.H.‘s official nonprofit status and finding storage room (besides their carport) for the debris they sort, study and count.
Volunteer training is set for Jan. 29. They’ll be at Haleiwa Farmers Market Jan. 30 and Hawaii Kai Farmers Market Feb. 5. They’ll also need help at their booth at the International Marine Debris Conference March 20-25 in Honolulu. To join up or learn more, visit http://www.b-e-a-c-h.org/ or call 393-2168.
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