This past weekend, 10,004 volunteers gathered at 45 waterfront sites for Heal the Bay's twenty-fifth annual Coastal Cleanup Day, and by the end of it all, they'd picked up 26,170 pounds of "cigarette butts, food wrappers, bits of Styrofoam, plastic bottle caps," and other assorted refuse that people couldn't be bothered to dispose of properly (and that's just an initial total). Every year, there are wacky unexpected items found among the trash—wedding dresses, "WWII-era gas masks," things that turn out to be surprisingly realistic replicas of human skulls. Heal the Bay says that this year did not disappoint in the weirdness category (though nothing will ever top the headless rooster found in 2012's cleanup). Here are the 10 greatest, oddest finds from HtB's 2014 event:
· a piece of a semi-automatic gun
· an intact handgun
· four octopuses and "at least 100 crabs" tangled up in man-made trash
· a horse saddle and cash register (Agoura Hills)
· a manhole cover (Compton Creek)
· a video promoting a transgender beauty queen contest (LA River)
· a Pepsi can from 1994 (King Harbor)
· an unopened bottle of the fine, under-$5 sparkling wine Andre
· small religious statuary:
· this pirate hat:
#Costalcleanup #Mostunusual #Trashselfie http://t.co/WMs7bbsIJR http://t.co/l1BqcCwGhR http://t.co/ydIMOK5S23
— Adam P Hunt (@HuntWMD) September 20, 2014
· Guns and Butts: Recap of Coastal Cleanup Day [HtB]
· Coastal Cleanup Nets Headless Chicken, Tattered Headshot [Curbed LA]