Durban beaches in serious trouble

Durban has lost the majority of its "blue flag" swimming beaches, the Mercury newspaper reported today.

The city has already lost four out of six flags, and one of the remaining two flags is likely to be pulled soon because of unacceptable faecal pollution readings.

The South African co-ordinator of the international Blue Flag beach scheme, Allison Kelly, said there was no clear explanation for the sudden deterioration in beach water quality. "It appears that there could be many factors causing the problem, from polluted rivers, illegal connections between sewage and storm-water systems, or possibly huge sewage spills.

"But whatever the cause, we are really concerned about the water quality on the eThekwini beaches."

Officials working on the problem
eThekwini official Andrew Mather said: "We are trying to find out what the problem is as quickly as possible, and then rehabilitate our blue flag programme."

The first two blue flags were withdrawn last year after it was unable to comply with World Health Organisation and South African standards for recreational water quality.

Blue Flag gives local and foreign visitors the knowledge that their beaches are clean, environmentally sound and adhere to international safety and other tourist standards.

Under the blue flag system water samples are collected fortnightly, and both Addington and North beaches had a 50% failure rate between October last year and the end of February.

The only remaining beach with consistently high water quality was Umhlanga main beach. - Sapa