This past Saturday, November 4th, 2023, we hosted our monthly cleanup dive in Hawaii. We returned to our most frequented marine debris removal location, Point Panic. Point Panic is a dive site located on the south shore of Oahu, near Waikiki. Even though we clean this site often, there is always an abundance of ocean trash. We had a large turnout of 17 volunteers and were blessed with great diving conditions. It threatened rain on the radar, but it turned out to be a beautiful day. It was high tide, making entry into the water especially easy.

Nudi Wear Volunteer divers diving in the Kewalo channel
Nudi Wear volunteer divers entering the water to go search for ocean trash
Nudi Wear divers entering the dive site

Once underwater, divers headed in different directions with different goals in mind. Some divers and freedivers stayed shallow and collected fishing line and lead from the upper rocky edge. Other divers headed out towards the ocean in search of better visibility. Many of the divers headed into the harbor to known locations with large accumulations of trash. After routinely cleaning this dive site for the past 4 years, we are now having to venture farther away from the entry/exit point. However, this is fantastic news! We can see the large impact we are having on the reef and marine ecosystem. Divers are reporting seeing more life on each dive! We saw large schools of fish, turtles, upside down jellyfish, Hawaiian lionfish, mantis shrimp, and so many different nudibranchs! Mahalo Katie Samuelson for the underwater photos.

After about an hour, divers surfaced with bags full of marine debris. It takes team work to get the heavy bags out of the water, up the stairs, and back to the collection point near the parking lot.

Nudi Wear co-owner, Christy, exiting the water after a successful cleanup dive removing ocean trash.

In that short amount of time, we were able to remove 237 pounds of trash from the ocean and another 7 pounds from the surrounding shoreline! Some noteworthy items removed include an airplane tire, an abdominal roller, 3 1-gallon glass jugs, a fan, a hazard light, a glass smoking pipe, plates, coffee mugs, and a coin cursed by a witch! You can read more about that HERE. We also found a lot of the usual items including 52 aluminum cans, 40 glass bottles, 10 plastic bottles, 8 plastic cups, 6 spark plugs, and 305 lead fishing weights.

Nudi Wear tackling the issue of marine debris removal at their monthly cleanup dive in Hawaii
Marine debris removed during a Nudi Wear cleanup dive
Nudi Wear volunteers sorting through the marine debris removed during the event
Ryan, co-owner of Nudi Wear, posing with an ab roller, a very unusual piece of marine debris found during the cleanup.
Various pieces of marine debris piled on a tarp during the Nudi Wear cleanup.
Approximately 100 lead fishing weights removed during the cleanup. Lead weights are a commonly found piece of ocean trash
A volunteer sorting through the ocean trash
2 Tires that were removed from the ocean. Tires are a frequently found piece of marine debris at Point Panic.
3 large glass jugs are part of the ocean trash removed during the cleanup
Drinking cups and a glass bong are part of the marine debris removed during the cleanup
A fan found among all the ocean trash removed during the cleanup
An abundance of marine debris removed from the dive site during the event
Plastic coin found among the ocean trash removed during the cleanup

Mahalo to all the volunteers who showed up to help chip away at the marine debris problem on Oahu. We hope you can join us for our next cleanup dive on December 16th with Santa Clause and Trident Adventures!