Rissa teamed up with the Tromsø Student Diving Club (SUT) and the Norwegian Lifesaving Organization (Redningselskapet) to organize a shore and underwater cleanup between Sørsjetéen and Polaria. This effort was part of the Byryddedagene (City Cleanup Days) and supported by Hold Norge Rent.

The cleanup team minus two, and the collected litter.

Sørsjetéen: Thriving life and pollution

The cleanup took place in the harbor near Polaria in the heart of Tromsø on the 10th of May. Everyday, people walk along the coast and boats cruise past. Additionally, the recent demolition of the so called Mack Øst building—where Storgata Camping was—has created additional traffic and waste in the area.

Much of the cleanup focused on the area around Sørsjetéen, a large stone jetty coming off of the shore. This jetty interrupts the currents and acts as a collecting ground for both marine life and pollution.

Waste from the construction site on its way to the sea.

The volunteers joining Rissa Citizen Science's events are already familiar with the Sørsjetéen site through our effort restoring a kelp forest along one side of the jetty. Since 2023, volunteers have been diving at this site, lowering the density of sea urchins in an attempt to promote kelp growth. You can learn more about that project here.

Dive on in!

The crew for this event was composed of two teams: the diving team and the land team. Supported by the expertise and volunteers from SUT and Redningselskapet, five free divers and one scuba diver explored the sea bordering the jetty and shore, collecting any litter they could.

Fish Vegar after a productive dive along Søresjetéen.

Once their loads got too heavy, they’d bring their bags to our eager land team, who would empty the bags and send the divers back out.

The land crew sorted the findings and eventually tallied all the waste that was found. They also walked along the shore to pick up any other trash they could spot.

There was lots of trash to sort!

What did we find?

In total, 413 individual pieces of trash were collected from the sea and shore. Trash ranged in size from a tire to tiny shreds of plastic. The most common finds were styrofoam (109), unidentifiable pieces of plastic (105) and glass bottles (97). All the litter we collected was sorted into categories to be tallied. We logged all of our finds with Ryddenorge.no, which helps to track waste collected by volunteers throughout Norway.

The Rydde platform where we entered our observations.

One especially exciting find was a wallet that still contained an ID card and a number of credit cards (all long expired). A quick Facebook search revealed the owner was still local to Tromsø! Unfortunately, the wallet was not in good enough condition to be returned, but the owner was happy to learn the fate of her missing property.

Trying to find the owner of the wallet.

Get involved in your community

Community events like this are incredibly important. They utilize the enthusiasm and dedication of community members to make a real difference in the places they call home.

If you’re interested in getting involved in other citizen science and community events, check out the Rissa page. We’re always happy to welcome new volunteers!

And thank you again to SUT and Redningselskapet for this fun and meaningful day, and to Hold Norge Rent for providing the working gloves and bags.