Tar balls wash ashore along South Florida beaches, source unknown
LAUDERDALE-BY-THE-SEA - Oily tar balls have been washing up along South Florida beaches, stretching from Fort Lauderdale to Lake Worth Beach in Palm Beach County, raising environmental concerns and frustrating beachgoers.
While reports surfaced widely on social media Saturday, some residents say the issue has been ongoing.
"For the last nine or ten days, we've been seeing it," said Mario Palazzi, who walks the beach almost daily with Linda Gonzalez, picking up trash. "It's in the seaweed, and it sticks to your skin."
Palazzi showed an irritation on his leg where he struggled to scrape the tar off.
"If you touch it, it takes a lot of soap and water to get it off your skin," he said.
Gonzalez expressed concerns over the potential environmental and health impact.
"It's terrible to think what it's doing to the ocean, the reefs, and our health," she said. "I don't want to speculate what's causing it, but I haven't seen it this bad in a very long time."
The source of the tar remains unknown. The U.S. Coast Guard has been monitoring for spills and tracking oil tankers but has not identified a cause.
"They completed searches from Palm Beach to Port Everglades for the source, but it remains unknown," the Coast Guard tweeted over the weekend.
Fort Lauderdale temporarily closed a portion of its beach on Saturday, but it reopened on Sunday. Some of the tar balls were collected during routine beach cleanings, while others drifted back out to sea.
