If you’ve ever been to Boston Harbor, you might’ve heard of the Boston Harbor Islands, a group of several dozen islands sprinkled throughout the greater Massachusetts Bay. What you might not know is that these islands face constant threats due to pollution.
Two years ago, two Massachusetts organizations identified a serious problem. Visits to the outermost harbor islands, those beyond human settlement, revealed decades worth of debris and plastics. Once thriving island ecosystems became overrun with styrofoam, thousands of Poland Springs water bottles and old fishing gear. The Massachusetts Department of Conservation and Recreation and The Center for Coastal Studies understood they needed to do something radical. So, they enacted a “once-in-a-generation” cleanup, one never before seen in the history of the Harbor Islands.
The project, “Outer Boston Harbor Island Cleanup,” took place from Sept. 13–22, 2024, and aimed to remove debris from several key islands. The effort was spearheaded by the DCR and CCS, and featured support from several other prominent Mass. organizations and dozens of volunteers.
Laura Ludwig, director of the Marine Debris and Plastics Program at CCS, emphasized how impressive the scale of this initiative is.
“It’s hard to describe the magnitude of this project,” Ludwig said. “The planning that went into this was over the course of two years with no fewer than six agencies at the state, federal and local level.”
Ludwig works with the commercial fishing industry to address issues caused by lost fishing gear. She recently led over 70 volunteers in an “adventure cleanup” of the islands. An “adventure cleanup,” a phrase coined by Ludwig herself, goes beyond standard beach cleanups and was necessary for this massive project.
“Our cleanups have taken [beach cleanups] to another level,” Ludwig said. “They’re more like extractions, debris extractions, where we have to use heavy equipment, [and] spend a week at a time immersed in the location.”
In addition to the ambitious scale of the cleanup, this particular project posed unique challenges. The process of getting out to these remote islands was a challenge in itself.
“For two years, we worked together in planning this because these islands are not easily accessible,” Jorge J. Ayub, senior coastal ecologist for DCR, and an integral member of the two-year planning process, said. “[The islands] don't have a lot of visitation. They don’t have any infrastructure on them, because they’re the [outermost] islands, so they’re the most exposed to the weather conditions.”
Weather conditions were certainly a factor, as poor conditions during the week of the cleanup posed challenges for volunteers. Ludwig emphasized the importance of training and mental preparation prior to the cleanup in order to ensure the safety of participants.
“We have to endure long days of hot weather or freezing cold rain [and] driving wind. We have to navigate rocky shorelines, wear proper safety equipment, [and] use chainsaws [and] machetes to get to places so that we can actually get to the debris,” Ludwig said. “We have to have sure footedness; … we begin each day with 20 minutes of yoga or stretching, … [and] we eat healthily together in a group when we do these things. We're supporting each other as we go.”
John Yonce, a volunteer on the ground throughout the week, described the training experience leading up to the cleanup: “I’m an unskilled laborer. … I showed up and they provided almost everything we needed, gloves and personal protection equipment,” Yonce said. “It’s a very environmentally sensitive area out there. … Nothing’s without risk.”
Although many volunteers suited up to endure harsh conditions, other volunteers found ways to contribute outside of intense physical labor.
Another volunteer and full-time visual artist, Gin Stone, documented the project through photography. “I wanted to be there and I wanted to see … what direction the islands took my work just from being there,” Stone said.
With a brigade of volunteers and dozens of cranes, boats and equipment supplied by sponsoring government organizations, Ludwig and the team set out on their expedition. Upon initial arrival to the islands, Stone described a bizarre and disheartening scene.
“When I got there, I really felt like I was at a loss, because when you see the amount of trash, it's really overwhelming in a very personal way,” Stone said. “I picked up a giant styrofoam block and I turned it over, and there was an ant colony inside. There were millions of ants, and they had just completely used this substrate, this unnatural thing, to … make their entire colony.”
Stone conveyed the way in which the actual cleanup process, particularly the bagging of debris into large “super sacks,” informed her artistic vision for her photography.
“[When] the garbage and the trash … were consolidated into those super sacks, … [that] showed the sadness of the neglected islands, the neglected environment. And the solitude came out when I saw these bags sitting all around me,” Stone said.
Along with the overwhelming amount of garbage, the team also found artifacts and unopened objects dating back around 70 years. “One of the most interesting and impressive things that we found was a gas mask from the Navy from the 1940s,” Ayub said. “We found incredible things, like cans of crab meat still unopened, already blistered and ready to explode, … [and] an endless amount of lobster traps.”
By the end of the week, the team emerged with an unbelievable amount of debris, each bag weighing one ton. This didn’t include the wood, lobster traps and other large plastic pieces also removed during the cleanup. Yonce expressed the relief and gratification he felt as he witnessed the bags piling up.
“At the end of the day, you’re tired, you're sore, you’re cold, you’re wet, but you look at this huge pile of just crazy amounts of debris that we're pulling out of there; … it was very gratifying,” Yonce said.
Ludwig emphasized her appreciation for her team and the successful partnership between organizations.
“It was very much a group effort and strengthened the relationship between the [CCS] and the DCR,” Ludwig said.
From the volunteer’s perspective, Stone emphasized the swift bonds she formed with her fellow crewmates were driving factors in their ultimate success.
“It was amazing how people buddied up immediately. We all would come into the mess hall, and you just automatically start sitting at the same table with the same people,” Stone said. “I think what happens is, like in boot camp, you get thrown in with all these people, and then by the end, you’re family to them.”
Yonce alluded to how the diversity of professions and backgrounds in the group served as an asset to their success.
“People came from different backgrounds and different attitudes. There were artists, there were engineers, there were manual laborers, everything in between, coming together,” Yonce said. “It was a great experience.”
One of the key partners directly involved in the effort, Boston Harbor Now, developed a new project in collaboration with the DCR and the National Park Service earlier this year. The new project aims to revamp Boston Harbor Now’s Marine Debris Removal Program on Peddocks Island, a separate harbor island. Sahil Duvadie, volunteer program manager for Boston Harbor Now, emphasized the partnership between organizations is ongoing.
“We definitely all will come together and discuss how we can continue [The Boston Harbor Islands Cleanup] moving forward. … We want to continue the longevity of our programs. We don’t just want to do a program and have the program end,” Duvadie said.
The successful effort also caught the attention of other harbor-based non-profits, including Save The Harbor Save The Bay, a group with a similar mission to preserve the ecological health of and increase overall accessibility to the harbor. Chris Mancini, director of Save The Harbor Save The Bay praised the DCR's efforts.
“It’s really remarkable that they were able to coordinate this group to do a week-long focused effort in this hard-to-reach area, … and we’ll be happy to be a partner on the next one, ” Mancini said.
Despite a week-long endeavor and praise from local officials and community members, the work from the project is far from complete. Ludwig and Ayub explained that they are in the midst of an intricate process to classify and sort collected materials for reuse.
“The main goal of this cleanup was to repurpose and recycle as much as we can before we even attempt to send something to the landfills,” Ayub said.
Ayub brings to light an important aspect of the project: sustainability. In addition to the collection of waste, proper disposal and recycling of materials is essential.
Ludwig explained that her goal is to use the collected marine debris data and visual evidence to bring awareness to sustainable causes. Simultaneously, she’s realistic about her scope of influence.
“I’m a pragmatist, I mean, we’re not going to be solving the pollution crisis by cleaning these islands,” Ludwig said. “We had 4,000 water bottles on these islands. … I’m not envisioning that I’m going to convert a whole bunch of water bottle drinking people, but maybe a couple of them will step up to the plate and say, ‘You know what? I don't agree with this, and I think we should do something different.’”
Yonce, who is also the senior vice president of strategic development for an organization called Clean-Seas Inc., expanded upon Ludwig’s sentiment and implied individual actions can lead to more widespread progress both in and outside of the harbor.
“You can be a part of this, even if you don’t have a day or a week to take off to go help the [DCR] on the Boston Harbor Islands, you certainly do have … an extra second to think, ‘Do I really need this single-use plastic today, or can I use something else?’” Yonce said.
While drumming up awareness for sustainable practices was one result of the project, a genuinely unwavering sense of optimism was another. Ayub described the sense of optimism he felt on the second to last day of the project.
“Maybe this is something that we should do every five years,’” Ayub said. “It makes me really optimistic that this will hopefully be the beginning of something greater.”
Ludwig’s positivity stems from what she saw in her team of volunteers throughout the week: “I have tons of hope. I just spent a week with 70 volunteers who loved working in terrible conditions, soaking wet and sandy all through their hair. … People love to do this stuff,” Ludwig said. “How can you not have hope? We all care. Somebody cares. If one person cares, then there's always hope.”
