Presentation Secondary School Tralee students taking part in the Big Beach Clean on Banna Beach last week.AN amazing 780 volunteers from Kerry removed an estimated 4.6 tonnes of litter from the county’s towns, villages, coastline and inland waterways, during the Big Beach Clean weekend.
In total an estimated more than 58 tonnes of marine litter was removed during the Big Beach Clean, thanks to the incredible efforts of 9,700 volunteers who rallied from coast to coast across all 26 counties for this annual call to action.
Held to mark the end of the Irish bathing season, and to coincide with the International Coastal Cleanup by Ocean Conservancy, the Big Beach Clean took place from the 18th to 20th of September.
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This annual event combines beach-cleaning with a global citizen science action, to record data on the quantities and categories of litter items found along our shores.
In Kerry, TY Students from Presentation Secondary School, Tralee coupled their annual surf trip to Banna with a Big Beach Clean.
The group surfed, did a beach clean, filled out marine litter data cards, and Clean Coasts officer Elaine Doyle gave a talk on marine litter. Unusual items found included a golf tee and a nappy found in the dunes.
Volunteers in Castlegregory.Seven volunteers from Castlegregory Tidy Towns took on the Big Beach Clean at Castlegregory Beach removing approximately 30kgs of litter.
The group also discovered several bags of 1990s household rubbish, including a Telecom Eireann call card from around 1992.
The Big Beach Clean 2026 was kindly supported by Kia Ireland, who helped fund clean-up equipment and supplies to the thousands of volunteers throughout the country who registered their clean-up actions.
