‘Black Mayonnaise,’ Huge Boulders, Boat Parts Dredged up From Gowanus Canal
(DNAINFO) Leslie Albrecht | November 25, 2016 — The EPA has begun a $506 million Superfund cleanup of one of the nation’s most polluted waterways.
It’s a disappointment for treasure hunters but good news for tree huggers.
Contractors removing debris from the Gowanus Canal haven’t found any archeological gems, but they’ve made important progress on the canal’s $506 million cleanup, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency officials said Tuesday.
“I know people were hoping to find the wreck of the Andrea Doria, but unfortunately it’s just urban debris,” the EPA’s community involvement coordinator Natalie Loney said, referring to the infamous shipwreck favored by treasure divers.
The recently completed debris removal project took pieces of old boats and trees out of the canal and uncovered exactly one big surprise: some “unexpected big boulders,” said Christos Tsiamis, the EPA’s remediation project manager.
Tsiamis said the boulders’ origin was a mystery, in part because of the polluted waterway’s past neglect. “For decades, nobody was really paying attention to the canal. Now everybody is,” Tsiamis said.
In fact, interest in the much-abused canal is now so intense that Tsiamis and Loney led a tour Tuesday for visitors who wanted a peek at some of the debris removed from the canal over the past several weeks.