This desecration started back in June 2019. Residents flying home to the island witnessed a lot of excavating activity adjacent to the airstrip. They were concerned that loose soil excavated from above the runway was being used to fill in a road and that inadequate screening would result in the soil being washed into the sea, impacting on surrounding coral gardens.
A few weeks later and the same residents became even more alarmed when they realised that the soil excavated from above the runway was being dumped on top of rocks below the High Tide mark in an effort to construct 'Jetty Road' linking the kiosk to the 'soon-to-be', illegal boat ramp. A series of photographs illustrates the 'construction' of this road on 25 August 2020.
Photo taken from below the road illustrating the 'rock' base.
Soil roughly compacted between the rocks with no screening.
Soil compacted on road surface with no screening on bank leading directly into Coral Sea and coral gardens.
Finally the Island Manager roughly rolled silt screening below the soil, presumably to prevent the soil from slipping further into the spaces between the rocks. There was still no attempt to protect the soil from being washed into the ocean.
Needless to say, at the next high tide, soil eroded into Egremont Passage. Over a year later, evidence of silt on soft coral can still be seen - nothing short of an environmental disaster for the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park. Clearly, no approvals had been soughtt and no engineering had been done. When the Island Manager realised the road was unusable, he abandoned it and proceeded to build an alternative access road to the illegal boat ramp area down a very steep hill - once again, no approvals were sought nor engineering done. Erosion still occurs during rain periods washing directly into the sea.
After the first rains over Christmas 2020, 'Old Jetty Road' was revisited.
The remains of 'Old Jetty Road' gradually being washed into the ocean. Here is a half-hearted attempt at screening to prevent erosion.
This photo shows the degrading sheeting that has been left to pollute the environment.
The photographic evidence shows that even more erosion into the Coral Sea has occurred, exposing the sheeting originally used beneath the soil.
Unsightly debris littering the bank destined for the Coral Sea, including old tyres used for fill.
Surely a full clean up should be insisted upon. With one cyclone, or even a strong northerly wind with a big tide, and all this would be in the sea.
The illegal boat ramp and surrounds was brought to the attention of the Queensland Government in March 2020 and an inspection was finally carried out in June 2020. However, it was only in December 2020 that the illegal boat ramp was labelled as 'not fit for purpose' by the Department of Resources. The Department of Environment & Science advised the Island Manager that he would have to have an engineered solution to the erosion problem installed by 1 November 2020. Nothing has been done, so the environmental catastrophe continues.
Photos and content by Karen Anne Jean Cooke.