'Australia's best beach', Misery Beach, littered with rubbish and microplastics after tourist boom
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Used nappies, face masks, cigarette butts and plastic water bottles are among items dumped by visitors to a beach considered Australia's best, leaving clean-up volunteers furious.
Sea Shepherd Albany hosted a clean-up on Sunday at Misery Beach, which was named the best beach in the nation by Tourism Australia in January.
The beach, within the Torndirrup National Park on WA's south coast, has recorded a massive influx in visitors since it was crowned the best in Australia, with residents noticing an increase in litter.
About 1,200 pieces of rubbish were collected, totalling about 15kg of waste.
Sea Shepherd coordinator Chloe Kobel said the area had high environmental importance.
"Misery Beach was named the number one beach and we were looking to keep it as the number one beach and remain worthy of its title, but also highlight the critical importance of leaving no trace," she said.
Ms Kobel said while some rubbish was accidentally left behind, other items had obviously been dumped.
She said while larger items such as nappies and water bottles were more conspicuous, smaller plastics known as microplastics posed a greater environmental threat.
"We found around 1,000 pieces of microplastic, including the nurdles which are the rawest form of plastic, the tiny little bead-looking plastics," she said.
A recent study by researchers from Curtin University found microplastics were present in the world's most remote oceans.
Microplastics are often eaten by sea creatures and mostly likely ingested by people eating seafood, but how much of a health risk they are has not been determined.
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