JB in so cal
09-20-2006, 06:40 PM
Artificial reef made of tires becomes ecological disaster. What began 30 years ago as an idealistic plan to shape an artificial coral reef has become an underwater wastelandBY TRENTON DANIEL
tdaniel@MiamiHerald.com
FOR THE MIAMI HERALD
A plan in the early 1970s to create a massive artificial reef off Fort Lauderdale has turned into an environmental mess with the U.S. Navy, Broward County and others trying to figure out how to remove about two million tires covering 36 acres of ocean floor.
What was intended to lure game fish now is damaging sensitive coral reefs and littering Broward's tourist-populated shoreline.
''They thought it would be a good fish habitat. It turned out to be a bad idea,'' said William Nuckols, project coordinator and military liaison for Coastal America, a federal group involved in the cleanup. ``It's a coastal coral destruction machine.''
The tires dot the ocean bottom a mile and a half from the end of Sunrise Boulevard. Environmentalists say strong tides -- especially during hurricanes and tropical storms -- cause the loose tires to knock against coral reefs, disrupting the ecosystem. In some cases, tires have washed ashore.
tdaniel@MiamiHerald.com
FOR THE MIAMI HERALD
A plan in the early 1970s to create a massive artificial reef off Fort Lauderdale has turned into an environmental mess with the U.S. Navy, Broward County and others trying to figure out how to remove about two million tires covering 36 acres of ocean floor.
What was intended to lure game fish now is damaging sensitive coral reefs and littering Broward's tourist-populated shoreline.
''They thought it would be a good fish habitat. It turned out to be a bad idea,'' said William Nuckols, project coordinator and military liaison for Coastal America, a federal group involved in the cleanup. ``It's a coastal coral destruction machine.''
The tires dot the ocean bottom a mile and a half from the end of Sunrise Boulevard. Environmentalists say strong tides -- especially during hurricanes and tropical storms -- cause the loose tires to knock against coral reefs, disrupting the ecosystem. In some cases, tires have washed ashore.