Ketam Coastal Clean-up 2021

A Labour of Love

Singapore is know for her clean and green image: litter-free streets, environmental sustainability initiatives and lush forested areas across the island. In efforts to contribute to a healthier eco-system, 10 boats participated in a coastal clean-up of Pulau Ketam – a little island south-west of Pulau Ubin. A popular anchorage for Singapore’s yachties, 8 out of the 10 participating boats stayed overnight in the quaint channel, waking up bright and early for the 9am beach sweep.

In a span of just 1 hour, sailors picked up hundreds of kilograms of trash, with a bulk of the rubbish attributed to plastic bottles. Some of the unusual items discovered includes motorcycle helmets and toys. It was certainly both sad and satisfying as participants came to a realization that no matter how much rubbish was picked, there was still more left behind. This activity provides greater awareness through small but consistent efforts to create a more sustainable eco-conscious environment for Members and visitors.

Big thank you to MPA for allowing the Club to conduct this activity despite the short notice. Also big thanks to Richard Howe for providing his Grand Banks as the Trash Transport!

Last but not least, thank you to the following boats for labouring over this weekend to keep our country clean:

  1. Jaza Too
  2. Annapuri
  3. Cicak
  4. SDF
  5. Red Rum
  6. Monserrat
  7. Exodus
  8. Rumbottle
  9. Merlin
  10. Haruna
  11. Grand Banks

If you missed out this round, do not fret! We plan to organise similar clean-up activities on a more regular basis – look out for updates on our newsletter.

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CSC Eco Sailing Day

Sailors from Changi Sailling Club took part in a beach and water way clean up over National Day this year. The idea was to raise awareness about the ever growing problem in our seas of plastic pollution

The club has started to ban the use of plastic by not giving out plastic bags anymore, and discouraging the use of straws. Even?by?doing something as small as preventing one person from using a straw or plastic bag, it does mean that one less piece of plastic is used. But is this really enough to raise awareness about the plastic we consume every day?

Most people are not very aware of the?harm plastics do to the environment. Sure, they have seen pictures of plastic pollution in other countries, but to them, it does not matter. Why? Because they can?t?see?it.? Rubbish gets swept into the seas. People that leave their rubbish on beaches get their trash swept away by the waves. Even innocent mistakes happen in which a sudden gust of wind can sweep a plastic cup off a beachside cafe (or boat!) and drop it into the sea.?These bits of rubbish, plastic especially, damage wildlife and coastal ecosystems. Animals mistake the plastic for food, they get caught in it and strangle themselves. And that?s just the plastic that we can see. There are?micro plastics?in the sea too that come from broken down pieces of plastic, the beads in facial and body scrubs, and cosmetic products.

So we thought that it would be good for the club and its members to raise awareness about the harm of these plastic products by arranging a beach cleanup.? We did two beach cleanups. One at Pulau Ketam, a small island to the southeast of Pulau Ubin, and one on the beach in front of Changi Sailing Club.

Pulau Ketam is an uninhabited island. No one lives on it. It?s just full of mangroves and wildlife. At least, that?s what it?s supposed to be like. Instead, what we found was straight out of a horror story. Literally. Plastic bottles everywhere. Deodorant, shampoo bottles. Cigarette lighters, shoes, styrofoam, fishing line, even a helmet.

We did an audit of the rubbish we got from the Ketam. It was about 25 kilograms.? Thanks to Notus, SDF, Southern Light and Emanuel 2 for joining the overnight camp and morning clean-up. In particularly thanks to the NTU team from Notus who collected the lions share of the garbage from Ketam. (A further 25 kilograms were collected from the waterway clean up and the Changi beach clean up by other boats and other members ).? That?s 160 plastic bottles, 34 bottle caps, 5 hangers, 8 pieces of cutlery, 6 cigarette lighters, 10 flip flops, 6 glass bottles, 24 straws, 8 cans, 4 spray bottles and 2 lightbulbs. All in half an hour?s work.

The top brands we counted were Ice Mountain, 100 Plus, Dixy, Coca Cola,? Dasani and Sprite.? 46 bottles had no visible brand. But they mostly seemed to be mineral water bottles.

Sadly after the Ketam clean up the island still didn’t look any different, such is the scale of the problem.

What can we as sailors do to help the environment? Here are a few ideas

  1. Take a piece of plastic garbage back every time you visit a beach or go out to sea. (If 1,000 sailors do this every weekend that’s 1,000 fewer pieces of rubbish on our shores).
  2. Refuse mineral water. Fill up your own water bottles from the taps at the end of the pier.
  3. Insist on ‘no straw’ when you order a drink for yourself and others
  4. Bring your own plastic bag when shopping
  5. Don’t do takeaway drinks or food unless you bring your own containers
  6. Suggest to big drinks companies that they spend their Research & Development money on finding bio-degrable alternatives to plastic rather than new tastes or brands of their beverages

CSC Eco-Sailing Day 2018

On Singapore’s 53rd Birthday, Changi Sailing Club members stepped out of their comfort zones to do their part for Singapore and the Environment – participating in a large-scale clean-up of our waterways and coast line along the north-eastern rim of Singapore.

Armed with biodegradable trashbags, fishing nets and other interesting tools, sailors on 10 Keelboats, 3 Pacers and 1 Trimaran took part in a 2 hour morning clean-up of the Johor Straits. It was both heartening and sad to see the mountains of trash collected from just 2 hours of sailing – accumulating over 60kg of plastic pollution between CSC and Pulau Ketam.

Boats involved:

  1. Cicak
  2. SDF
  3. Southern Light
  4. Emmanuel II
  5. Notus
  6. Jong Dee
  7. Marsh Mellow
  8. Jong Dee
  9. Big Bad Wolf
  10. Summer Breeze
  11. Olive Oyl

On shore, there were sizzling hotdogs on the bbq for hungry sailors, as well as a myriad of eco-friendly products on sale at the Eco-Bazaar. CSC is very happy to support local eco-brands to raise awareness of the alternatives to plastic available in the market, and make small but consistent efforts to create a more sustainable eco-conscious environment for Members and visitors.

Vendors

  1. Bamboo Straw Girl
  2. Nature Rustic
  3. The Lala Lokal
  4. Coopita
  5. The Green Collective
  6. Oh Honey!

After lunch, further activities included a scavenger hunt-styled beach clean up, movie screening of “A Plastic Ocean” and a live screening of the NDP 2018 at the Ubin Lounge to wrap up a really productive day!

Thank you to all members, family and friends who dropped by to support this Event.

Together, we can make a difference 🙂

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