In celebration of World Ocean’s Day, Atlantis, Paradise Island through its Marine & Water Park Operations Division (MWPO) recently teamed up with various NGO’s and the New Providence community at large for a clean up at South Beach.  

The first of several initiatives organized by staff members, the June 3rd clean up is being touted as a rousing success, as scores of residents and Atlantis team members turned out.

Vice President of Water Features and Aquaventure within MWPO, Michelle Liu Williamson expressed her gratitude for the support and encouraged others to continue efforts to maintain a cleaner beach environment beyond World Ocean’s Day.

“Although this clean up is something we’ve done as a department for years, this is the first time we have partnered with the community and we are pleased and so very thankful for the support. We must all understand the importance of maintaining a healthy eco-system.

Through this clean up we’ve collected a lot of debris and garbage; lots of plastic and styrofoam which takes so long to degrade.

The chemicals that these products are made from, when we just casually and thoughtlessly leave them thrown about on the beach, gets into our water table and into our soil and indirectly we are affected; we ingest that… so it’s really important that when you come out to enjoy the beach, bring a trash bag with you so that you can take your garbage with you and then be sure to properly dispose of it.”  

Bahamas Reef Environment Educational Foundation (BREEF) and Bahamas National Trust (BNT) were among the partners in Saturday’s clean up efforts.

World Ocean’s Day, observed June 8th, is a global celebration of the world’s oceans. Initiatives are held world-wide to raise awareness of the importance of ensuring our oceans are kept clean and healthy. In addition to a Coral Reef Art Competition and an Oceans Facts Quiz, Atlantis also encouraged its team members to be “Creatively Blue” by wearing something blue on June 8th.