Contractor dumps rubble into the sea, “no more waste, but temporary storage”

The contractor is building new beach heads between Wenduine and De Haan to reinforce the coast. But according to hiker Pieter Goegebuer, things went wrong with those radical works just before the weekend. “What struck me most last Thursday was that the contractor dumped the waste, several trucks at low tide, on this side of the beach in the direction of De Haan. You can still see it at low tide. It concerns stone rubble, rubbish, plastic, rebar. , glass and especially black sand, which is strange, I call it fly-tipping.

De Haan’s environmental department has been informed. The mayor also contacted the Coastal Service, which is having the works carried out. According to him, there is a mistake: “I don’t think that such large companies that have billion-dollar contracts with the Flemish government will just dump some waste into the sea. That seems unlikely to me.”

“Temporary storage”

“Debris has indeed been detected at the low-water line, at the stock zone at Cabane beach access,” they respond to the Agency for Maritime Services and Coast. “That rubble comes from the demolition of the old beach abutments and is temporarily stored in that zone, to be used again in the construction of the new beach abutments. So it is not waste. The contractor immediately started cleaning up. If necessary there will be a second cleanup.” (read more below the photo)

Wrong action

In order to limit the transport of stones, there is a reuse procedure for sifting the remains of old beach abutments and processing them again in the sea. “Apparently there was a wrong action last week and something went wrong with a cargo,” the mayor says. “The contractor has immediately said that he will clean that up.”

De Haan is confident that everything will be in order once the beach works have been completed. The first phase, the demolition of the beach heads, is on schedule and should be completed by the end of April.