Simply, fishing nets are discarded into the sea because they cannot be salvaged safely from the surface!

In our local environment of the Tunku Abdul Rahman marine park, dumping fishing nets within the parameters of the park is usually because it’s been caught by the corals of the reef. It is illegal to discard marine debris, such as devastatingly detrimental fishing nets, however it’s very difficult to police such activities.

Downbelow operations support the local governing bodies by fully sponsoring all logistics and a team of professional divers to remove the ‘ghost net’. All conservation programs we conduct, no matter how small, are documented to raise awareness within the public to educate and inspire others’ to be responsible for everyday actions that affect the health of our natural environment.

This will be so valuable for statistics in future to be used as evidence for how conservation efforts do make a positive difference! Just as with all other net removals, the team of committed Project AWARE divers recorded the facts, such as depth, length of the net, marine life perished and all that proves useful to the future of environmental health.