More than a tonne of plastic cleared from beaches

A charity has removed more than a tonne of rubbish from some of the most remote coastlines in the UK.

Clean Ocean Sailing's team of 16 Cornwall-based volunteers collected just under 1.3 tonnes of plastic, fishing gear and other waste from nine islands around the Isles of Scilly during a three-week expedition.

The project builds on previous clean-up missions in Scilly, where ocean currents carry debris from across the Atlantic and deposit it on beaches.

The rubbish was taken back to Cornwall on the 118-year-old sailing vessel Annette were it will be sorted, counted and recycled. It said some of the recovered plastic would be turned into products including kayaks, plant pots and dog leads.

Steve Green, founder of Clean Ocean Sailing, said the idea for the charity began after he was blown off course while paddling around Scilly in a canoe in 2016.

He said he became "absolutely horrified by the amount of rubbish" on the islands and described them as "the first landfall for everything that's floating around in the North Atlantic, basically".

"We thought we really need to do something about this," he said.

The charity carried out its first major clean-up in 2019 and has returned several times since, although Green said funding challenges had made it difficult to run the expedition every year.

The organisation was continuing to raise money through a crowdfunding campaign to cover the costs of the project, he said.

This year's mission was supported by donations, local organisations and businesses, with volunteers helping to clear beaches across the islands.

Green said much of the waste consisted of discarded fishing gear, which he described as "the most dangerous stuff" because of the risk it poses to wildlife.

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