Beach Sand Coming

Tuesday, July 13, 2004

The re-nourishment of the southern Seven Mile Beach is scheduled to begin next month with the arrival of a barge of sand from the sister British Overseas Territory Turks and Caicos, according the Director of the Department of Environment (DoE), Gina Petrie-Ebanks.

The replenishing of this renowned stretch of beach with imported sand was one of the Beach Erosion Committee’s recommendations, a committee Mrs Petri-Ebanks co-chaired along with the Minister, Hon McKeeva Bush.

“We are expecting the arrival of sand from Turks & Caicos. One reason the sand is coming from there is the high quality of the sand,” said Mrs Petrie-Ebanks.

As a result of the close monitoring and assessment of sand movement by the Lands & Survey Department, along with the input of consultants and the local community, the DoE has narrowed the zone of re-nourishment. “The contract calls for the sand to be placed along the beach from Royal Palms south to Crescent Point,” she said.

According to Mrs Petrie-Ebanks, this section of Seven Mile Beach was in poor shape last summer, with many of the properties in this stretch losing their beachfront. “The feeling was that Seven Mile Beach was in a deficit with regards to sand due to the developmental impact and the weather changes. With foundations, pools, tennis courts, and roads being built, along with the weather, there have been a variety of impacts.

“We decided that the best way to go about this was to put sand back into the system. The sand may move along from the beach but will stay in the system. We find that in the winter sand tends to return, but still we think it is important and a wise thing to do,” she said.

The contract from the DoE for the beach re-nourishment was awarded to West Indian Marine Ltd. John MacKenzie, the Managing Director of that company said that once the barge with the sand arrives next month, the work of applying the sand would take three to four months. An advantage of the sand coming from the Turks & Caicos is not only the quality of the sand, but the short shipping distance, which keeps the freight costs down.
One factor affecting the time is the size of the barge and the question of how many trips there will be to bring all the sand here, Mr MacKenzie said. In addition the sand will be taken in through the port and trucked down to the prescribed areas. “This is the best time of year to do this for the water is calm and the number of tourists is low,” he said.

Mr MacKenzie pointed out that Nor’westers tend to re-nourish Seven Mile Beach, but he stressed that it was not only storms approaching from the south which eroded Seven Mile Beach. “Any light weather system from the southwest can do equal damage, if it is over a period of time,” he said.

Saying that changing beach patterns were a natural occurrence, Mr MacKenzie pointed to areas in South Sound where there were once white sandy beaches. “There is now rock, rubble, and rough coral. It is sad to see but it is no one’s fault. It’s all a part of nature,” he said.

Comparing the Cayman Islands sand situation to similar ones in the United States, Mr MacKenzie emphasized that the United States has the advantage of a large continental shelf not far from its shore. Communities in the United States can run a dredge line out to this shelf and constantly re-nourish their beaches. The Cayman shore has no such shelf.

One hope that Mr MacKenzie holds for the upcoming sand re-nourishment is that the Beach Erosion Committee will seek ways to protect the newly imported sand once it is put in place. He fears that the new sand could slip back into the sea just as the original shore has eroded. Planting natural indigenous plants always helps preserve a beach, he said.

Mr MacKenzie highly recommends that the Beach Erosion Committee consider placing ProTecTubes under the sand, which serve as safeguards for the newly applied sand.

“These tubes have been used extensively in Florida for twenty years and the state of Texas has just signed on to use miles and miles of these tubes along their coastline. I consider it the best system for stabilizing the sand on a coast. I hope the government will approve the ProTecTubes, if not extensively, then at least on a smaller, trial basis where they can test it,” he said.

The ProTecTube is a device not nearly as costly as reef-balls or seawalls. In addition, the tubes are the same color of the sand and become visible only after storms, while maintaining the natural uplift of the beach. If the government does choose to implement the use of ProTecTubes, Mr MacKenzie noted that the best time to do so is immediately after the imported sand is added.

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