Displaying items by tag: smokies trash
Clean sweep: Volunteers remove tons of trash from Smokies in largest one-day cleanup
Volunteers who helped with the Save our Smokies cleanup on April 23 are shown here among their booty. Anna Lawrence/Hellbender Press
Amid the booze bottles and toilet paper, it’s ‘incredible what we found here’
Cleanup crews cleared garbage Earth Day weekend across Great Smoky Mountains National Park from mountain crests to the shores of Fontana Lake.
Save Our Smokies, which organized the April 23 event, called it the largest single cleanup ever attempted in the park. Volunteers wrangled some 5,000 pounds of garbage.
Save our Smokies Vice President Benny Braden said the organization removed 10,133 pounds of trash in all of 2021.
“Litter is a big problem. We can clean up a location and two months later we have to be back there because it’s worse than when we started,” Braden said in an interview Saturday morning at the Tremont section of the national park. “What gives us hope is our volunteers showing up,” he said, citing their tireless dedication.