Germany and Belgium have been hit hard by deadly floods this summer. This leads to great destruction, and with it a lot of rubbish. Furniture, toys, car parts and building material fell out and floated into the sea with the floodwaters.
But where does this rubbish end up?
There are many indications that it will end up in the sea gap in Frøya municipality in Trøndelag. Here they are now preparing for a huge cleaning job.
Odd Arne Arnesen, general manager at Mausund Field Station on Frøya, says it is a natural explanation for why the station can expect large amounts of rubbish from the flood in Germany.
– The Gulf Stream strikes east right outside here and hits us quite hard. It settles as a filter for large parts of the coast. Therefore, much of the waste goes through the islands here and north, Andersen tells TV 2.
– MANAGER: Odd Arne Andersen is the general manager at Mausund Field Station Photo: TV 2
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Have done tests
They have also done extra tests before the flood in Germany which show that there is a high probability that there will be a lot of work for Mausund Field Station in the future.
– We are collaborating with a university in Germany, and just before the flood they did some simulations with GPSs that were thrown into the sea in the German Bay. The ocean currents meant that they ended up here with a short distance between each. Three of them were only a few hundred meters away from the Germans. This means that we now expect a great deal of the rubbish from the flood in Germany to end up here. It will be exciting to follow in the future, he enthusiastically tells TV 2 on Wednesday.
Erna Solberg visited the station on Wednesday, in connection with her election campaign start in Trøndelag this week.
Well prepared
Arnesen says they are prepared for the job that will meet them in 90 to 150 days. This is the estimate for when the rubbish will appear along the Norwegian coast.
– DESTRUCTIONS: The floods that ravaged Central Europe wreaked havoc. Photo: Sascha Schuermann / AFP
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– We take it as it is. We’ll get it when it’s coming. We must fix this, he says optimistically.
So far this year, the station has picked up 1,000 cubic meters of rubbish from Europe. 70 percent of the waste that comes to the station comes from there. The waste becomes something very sensible.
– We have an agreement with the Coast Guard, so they are here on a regular basis and take it with them to Trondheim, and there it goes in an incinerator and becomes energy.
– Love the trash
On Frøya, they are very happy that they can make a difference to nature.
– We love the rubbish we. We were more terrified of it at first. Then I think it was awful, but now we rejoice when we find the tide with a lot of rubbish. Then we know that we will get a lot brought ashore and it will be very clean after us. It’s a bit of the driving force for us is to look for a lot of rubbish, Arnesen concludes to TV 2.
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