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Earth 8: Coastal Cleanup Day is this Saturday

The annual Coastal Cleanup Day is Saturday, September 15 and thousands of volunteers will participate, including employees from KFMB.

SAN DIEGO (NEWS 8) — The annual Coastal Cleanup Day is Saturday, September 15 and thousands of volunteers will participate, including employees from KFMB.

News 8’s Heather Myers will emcee the kickoff event on Mission Bay as part of this Earth 8 event in partnership with I Love a Clean San Diego.

“We expect about 7500 volunteers in San Diego plus an additional few thousand in Tijuana,” said the group’s interim director, Natalie Roberts-Decarli.

The biggest environmental cleanup event of the year goes from 9 a.m. to noon.  There are more than 100 sites welcoming volunteers all over San Diego County.

“If you go to the website you can see a big map of all of the different cleanup sites and it's really easy to spot one in your own neighborhood,” said Roberts-Decarli.

The kickoff event with Heather Myers begins at 9 a.m. in South Shores Park on Mission Bay, right next to Sea World.

Crews will be picking up cigarette butts, trash and plastic waste that gets into the watershed, flows to the ocean and harms wildlife.

I Love A Clean San Diego’s Interim Executive Director Natalie Roberts-DeCarli, Outreach Educator for Project Wildlife Carly Padilla and animal ambassador Mandy the opossum stopped by Morning Extra with a preview of the event.

“We have some pieces of plastic that came out of the stomach of an albatross, which is a bird.  So, basically they mistake plastic in the ocean for food and they ingest it,” said Becca Kuntz of I Love a Clean San Diego.

Team KFMB will be there and volunteers from SDG&E will be painting mural locations on Fiesta Island.  They will transform ugly, tan storage containers into artwork.

“This (container) is going to have lots of ocean creatures, coral, bubbles, stuff like that to remind people what goes on under the surface.” said mural artist Rob Tobin, with ARTS-A Reason to Survive.

Site captains will be on hand to help out and point you in the right direction.

“I love giving back to the community, working with I Love a Clean San Diego and keeping our inland and beaches clean,” said Oceanside site captain Nicky Kullback.

It helps if you bring your own trash bucket and a reusable water bottle to your work site, and maybe a pair of gloves.

But what we really need is you for just three hours on Saturday morning.

“We like if you register but we do accept walk-ons.  We really just want as many volunteers to come out as possible and it's a family friendly event so all ages are welcome,” said Roberts-Decarli.

Last year, volunteers collected about 70 tons of trash.

Click here to register for Coastal Cleanup Day.

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