More than 500 tyres collected from Plymouth Sound

Volunteer divers who have been working in Plymouth Sound are celebrating collecting more than 500 tyres from the seabed.

The Ships Project, which is a not-for-profit organisation that researches and explores maritime historical sites, is halfway through its scheme to raise 1,000 tyres from the ocean floor.

However, the scale of the problem is much bigger than originally thought and it is feared the number of tyres in the water could run into thousands.

After five years, The Ships Project has retrieved more than 23,000kg of rubbish from the water.

Tyres are often used as fenders on the side of boats.

When they break loose, they are found on the foreshore as well as in deeper water, polluting it as they degrade.

The project has even found a tractor tyre and a motorbike.

"It's not really The 1,000 Tyres Project, it's the 5,000 Tyres Project," said Mallory Haas, one of the directors of The Ships Project.

"There's quite a lot of rubbish down there and we only have about 70% of the waters around Plymouth surveyed so there's quite a lot more we just don't know about yet."

Gerrard Spear, another director of the project, said: "A lot of the divers, a lot of the fishermen now realise the importance of keeping the Sound and the area clean.

"We have volunteers that help us go out and collect these things.

"Fortunately we now have a route to get rid of them them which was always the stumbling block.

"You pull them out of the sea, chuck them in landfill, so what? They end up back in the sea again in a decade or two's time.

"This method of clearing them out and getting them recycled was key to the whole operation," said Mr Spear.

The Ships Project is continuing to fundraise so it can complete more scans of the waters around Plymouth and keep its boats out collecting the marine rubbish its surveys uncover.

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