Rozalia Project Intern Blog: What Lies Beneath…the Charles
I first worked with the Rozalia Project back in the fall of 2010. One drizzly morning, Rachael and I drove the ROV down to Boston for a day of trash pickup on the Charles River. The river had been stirred up by rain, and visibility was so poor that we could barely see the claws of the robot on the monitor despite the fact that they are literally inches away from the camera. Although the water was only 2 or 3 feet deep, from where I stood on the dock, I could not make out the bottom. As the ROV approached the riverbed, Rachael excitedly called me over to the monitor. To my astonishment, the bottom of the river was COVERED in trash. I ran back to the edge of the dock to try and see what the ROV could see. I still saw nothing. It was at that moment that I realized what a powerful tool the Rozalia Project has at their disposal. In mere minutes I had been exposed to an underwater world that would most likely shock most Bostonian pedestrians.The Charles River has struggled with pollution for over a century. In the 1960’s submerged cars, raw sewage spills and toxic discharges were not uncommon. As recently as 1995, the EPA gave the river a “D” rating and advised those who fell in it to get a tetanus shot. After decades of effort from groups such as the Charles River Watershed Association, the river is finally looking better. It was most recently rated at a “B+.” (“Charles)
While the river today is better than it once was, the pile of trash Rachael and I gathered in only a few hours (along with sonar images of larger, irretrievable objects such as tires) proves that the Charles is still polluted. Although waste treatment plants and industrial facilities have gotten better about what they release into the environment, average people still continue to litter. The majority of the (identifiable) objects we recovered that day were common items such as bottles, cans and clothing. It just goes to show that if people did not litter, there would be much less debris in the water. Small actions and slight lifestyle changes can go a long way toward protecting the environment.
As I blissfully piloted the ROV and collected items covered in black sludge, I had no idea that I would be sailing on the Charles practically every day for the next four years! Now I am even more motivated to keep the river clean. Although I do not have the technology to clean the bottom of the river, I have been making an effort to collect floating debris whenever possible. I am looking forward to reuniting with the Rozalia Project and the underwater world!
Works Cited: "Charles River Watershed Association." Charles River Watershed Association. Web. 09 Apr. 2012.
p 174 pieces of trash, much of it micro plastic. The next day we rented a car and headed south as I had the honor and pleasure of presenting about Rozalia Project at the Woods Hole Public Library. This little town on the Cape is the home of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, Sea Education Association, the Marine Biological Lab and a lot of smart, movers and shakers of the underwater world. One, Jeffrey Brodeur of Woods Hole Sea Grant, arranged the presentation and treated us to a tour of WHOI. We even got to see Alvin (and in a moment of joyous geekiness, we took pictures in the frame of this famed manned submersible) and we met some of WHOI's scientists and underwater technology pioneers. Very cool.
After Woods Hole, everything started heating up literally and figuratively. We were very lucky to have some well needed and excellent help from Susan Shingledecker and Alanna Keating from the Boat US Foundation who joined us on the boat at Courageous (yippee). We ran 2 full-on days with the Courageous Sailing program kids and the Charlestown Navy Yard basin where Courageous operates is a target rich environment. The VideoRay equipped with Blueview sonar and Lyyn image enhancement were working overtime to find piles of beer cans, bottles, a few bilge pumps, some boat parts and a fair amount of big debris. We had over 107 kids and instructors participating on American Promise as netters, tether handlers, sonar operators and copilots. The next day, we kept going with another 80 sailors joining in the trash hunt or coming back for more. Thanks to the Blueview sonar, we were even able to help a dive team locate an old mooring block for future removal (the visibility was so bad, that the diver simply could not find what he was looking for). We did another dock walk in addition to the work underwater and picked up another 593 pieces of trash!
(Nike), baseball cap, belt, glove, 3 pairs of sunglasses (none of value) and a glow necklace. We also scored CBI back a full Mercury mainsail that had been purchased the year before and a 30'+ lifting strap. Our most interesting find of the day however, was a Hood milk bottle that, at our first round of research, appears to be very old. It is stamped 1938 on the bottom and we are still working on ways to confirm its age. We still have some of the micro-plastics to count from the day at CBI but we picked up well over 200 pieces of trash and had around 220 people join us during the day or in the afternoon for the Trash Bash. And we appreciate my parents coming out in the ridiculous heat to check out the operation and even help with the tether and netting some bottles, cans and plastic out of the water!
, Nike sneaker and pirate flag