It’s been nearly three months since 109 shipping containers went overboard in B.C. waters, and to date, 105 of them are still missing.
Four of the MV Zim Kingston’s containers washed up along the north coast of Vancouver Island last November, but Canadian Coast Guard says the rest are unaccounted for.
“Despite efforts to model the potential trajectory of these containers, the exact location of approximately 105 of these containers is currently unknown,” it wrote in an emailed statement to Global News.
“The Canadian Coast Guard continues to work with the vessel owner to develop a plan to conduct a sonar scan of the area where the containers went overboard and an assessment of risk that the overboard containers could pose to the environment.”
While that work is underway, environmental groups say the products carried by those containers — including unicorn floaties, urinal mats, baby oil, cologne and coolers — are washing up on local shorelines.
“The funny thing is, you can find the pink unicorn at Rath Cove and Palmerston, but you’re finding the little pumps down at Grant Bay that go with them,” said Ashley Tapp, co-founder of the beach cleanup group Epic Exeo, in an interview.
According to Alys Hoyland, youth lead at Surfrider Pacific Rim, the province’s well-established network of beach cleaners has detected debris associated with the containers from as far north as Haida Gwaii to as far south as Victoria.
“Our two primary concerns really are around accountability and forward planning for how we prevent this kind of thing from happening again,” she told Global News.
“Specifically with marine debris, it’s incredibly difficult run with the kind of response that is the norm right now, which is once the beach is clean, the company has done it’s job because it’s just not true.”
The 109 shipping contains fell from the MV Zim Kingston in stormy waters last October, roughly 41 nautical miles west of the entrance to the Strait of Juan de Fuca, according to the Canadian Coast Guard.
In its statement, the coast guard said the vessel’s owner has hired a contractor to scan for the missing containers, but the contractor needs to wait for an appropriate weather window to complete the work.
“The ship owner will continue to check the known accumulation sites for debris every few months and remove debris likely to be from the Zim Kingston,” it wrote.
“The Canadian Coast Guard will also monitor for debris when conducting overflights in the West Coast Vancouver Island area and any reported debris believed to be from the Zim Kingston will be followed up on.”
The accident has strained the resources of Epic Exeo, which relies on fundraisers to pay for the supplies and helicopters that cart out the debris it collects from beaches. The amount of packaging that has washed up is “insane,” said Tapp, who lamented that much of it — unable to be recycled — will end up in landfills.
“We’re already such a small organization and we’re already working very hard to come up with funds to go clean up this regular marine debris and now we’ve added to it,” she explained.
“We’ve now added to the locations we have to get to, we’ve added the weight that we have to lift out of there. Our helicopter fees are our largest fees and they go by weight.”
Epic Exeo has offered to assist the Canadian Coast Guard with any cleanups and cleanup planning associated with the MV Zim Kingston, but Tapp said she’s not aware of any long-term plans for shoreline cleanup, as opposed to removal of debris from the ocean.
“Absolutely I want those cans out of the ocean, I don’t want them to open up, I don’t want more to come … but it’s clear to me that more product is washing up on shore, so they also need to put a plan in place for how we’re going to clean our coastline,” she said.
“That’s a part of it. It’s already happening.”
The MV Zim Kingston’s manifest is not publicly available, however, which makes it difficult for environmental groups to prove the origins of debris washing ashore, and the extent of the spread.
Hoyland said she’d like to push the federal government to hold large companies accountable for their accidents and all cleanup costs associated with it. It’s often communities who end up paying the price for their debris, which pollutes the areas they use to harvest food and earn a living, she added.
“What does true accountability look like for these companies that are making such huge profit at such huge environmental consequence?” she asked.
“Right now when we do beach cleans, it’s not unusual to find items related to container spills that happened in the 90s, so it’s not an issue that’s going away.”
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