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The Florida Keys are perhaps better known for their diving but there are spots all around the Florida coast, in particular Miami. In order to protect the area’s natural reefs from the stress of excessive human interaction while encouraging recreational fishing and sport diving in coastal waters, ‘artificial’ reefs are created out of a wide array of objects ranging from steel hulled ships, to army tanks, to commercial aircraft, to specially designed reef modules.

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“A potential grouper haven,” a county report opined. Artificial reefs made from tires “appear to be the next best thing to recycling.”

That was back in the spring of 1972, when the dumping of two million or so tires covering 36 acres offshore of Fort Lauderdale looked like ecological enlightenment. The project ultimately failed, and the “reef” has come to be considered an environmental disaster, ultimately doing more harm than good in the coastal Florida waters.

Now the Florida Department of Environmental Protection and the Broward County Environmental Protection Department (together with Coastal America, a partnership of federal agencies, state and local governments and private groups) are trying to organize a cleanup of what is known as the ‘Osbourne Tire Reef’ as part of a joint project utilising military salvage teams that would use the tire retrieval as a training exercise.

Ken Banks, a reef specialist for Broward County, who recently explored the site told the Washington Post recently. “It’s depressing as hell. We dove in and swam for what seemed like an hour and never came to the end of it. It just went on and on.”

Related Links

NOAA’s Marine Debris Program (Noaa.gov)
Osbourne Reef Waste Tire Removal Pilot Project (Florida Dept. of Enviroment)
Osbourne Reef (Wikipedia)