Saturday, August 7, 2010

Surfers Against Sewage are calling for 5 Thanet beaches to be stripped of their Blue Flag status

They are, Joss Bay, Margate main sands, West bay Westgate , Botany bay, Ramsgate main sands.

Here is the article http://www.sas.org.uk/news/2010/08/06/sas-call-for-35-blue-flags-to-be-withdrawn-from-beaches-around-the-uk/

I have had an initial look at this one and I really don’t think there is anything to worry about here during ordinary summer weather.

What they are talking about here is emergency discharge from storm drains and I think it is a problem that could occur almost anywhere in the world and on almost any beach.

It is hard to think of many tourist beaches without some sort of outfall pipe somewhere in the vicinity and from what I can find out information about what comes out of them and where they all are is a bit vague.

The way that bathing water quality is monitored is by testing the water that is actually in the sea where people bathe, working on the principle that if anything nasty is going into the sea nearby it would show up in regular tests.

Surfers Against Sewage seem to be talking about the outfall pipes near to the beaches that are properly listed and regulated and here in Thanet these are storm relief outfalls.
In simple terms, the only time that sewage is likely to be in the sea near the bathing beaches is after a very big rain storm, fortunately most of these occur in winter.

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