Tens of thousands volunteer in California on Coastal Cleanup Day
SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) -- Beaches and waterways around the Bay Area are cleaner today, thanks to an army of volunteers who spent their Saturday picking up trash on what's known as Coastal Cleanup Day.
They came armed with buckets and fanned out across every inch of Ocean Beach in San Francisco. Their mission: collect as much trash and plastic as possible. Ocean Beach was just one of many sites up and down the California coast that got the clean treatment on Saturday.
RELATED: Ship tows plastic clean-up system out of San Francisco Bay to Pacific Ocean
"It's Coastal Cleanup Day and we're gonna go out and pick up some trash off the beach. There's way too much of it," said one volunteer.
Some little ones could barely carry those buckets.
But others found everything from cigarette butts to sofa cushions.
RELATED: San Francisco leaders vote unanimously to ban plastic straws, single-use foodware
The trash was sorted and plastic got a closer look.
The nonprofit Surfrider Foundation documented items as part of the first "brand audit" to find the source of plastic pollution.
"We're looking a brands and we're looking at packaging, we're seeing how much of it is local, how much is foreign, what might be washing up from out in the ocean and and what people are leaving on the beach so we can find multiple solutions from all angles," said Surfrider volunteer Eva Holman.
RELATED: San Mateo's Tunitas Creek Beach gets a makeover, Martins Beach could open to public
The amount of plastic and trash found can be daunting.
But a cleaner coast and a cleaner ocean is the goal for everyone.
