More than two years after Hurricane Irma smashed into the Florida Keys as a Category 4 storm, the cleanup of canals is finally drawing to a close.
On Thursday, Monroe County officials held a celebration at one of the last canals to be cleaned, in Marathon.
Greg Tolpin, director of the restoration and disaster response contracting firm Adventure Environmental, says his teams have pulled out of the water all kinds of materials. "From cars and trucks to boats and docks, barbecue grills, refrigerators, a swimming pool, a hot tub, a trampoline," he said.
The company is now cleaning the last six canals out of the original 247 and should be done by the end of next week, he said.
So far more than 16,000 cubic yards of debris have been removed — enough to fill almost five Olympic-sized swimming pools.
Monroe County Commissioner Michelle Coldiron says one lesson the county has learned is to start the canal cleanup right away. After Hurricane Irma, it took almost a year to get the federal funding needed to unclog the canals.
"Just like it's important to get the debris off our side streets and US 1 highway, it's just as important the debris out of the canals so residents who use the water for work can get to work," she said. Commercial fishermen, fishing guides, dive captains and others all rely on the waterways to make their living.
The clean-up was funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. It took almost a year after the storm for the county to persuade the agency that the Keys canals qualified for the program.
"We have to change the rules, we have to change the laws … so in the future we don't have to wait a year," said Monroe County Administrator Roman Gastesi. "It took us a year to get going and a lot of stuff sunk."
