Friends of the Tug River remove more than 700 tires from river

WILLIAMSON, WV (WOWK) — The Friends of the Tug Fork River group continued their efforts to make sure the river stays tire-free. However, this time, they took out more than 700 tires.

“We did our first project at Borderland, it was what we thought would be an easy day but it turned out to be a major cleanup,” says Friends of the Tug Fork River Co-Founder John Burchett

Burchett goes on to say that since 2019, they’ve removed 14,380 tires from the Tug Fork River ranging from Matewan to Kermit. A little more than 1,000 of those have been recovered within the past few weeks.

While some have been dumped recently, Burchett says “most of these have been here for a very long time. Some of them have white walls from the 1980’s. Some of them have white walls this wide from the 40’s and 50’s.”

At first glance, you might take a look at the river and think it’s “tire-free.” However, Burchett says there’s still a lot of work to do under the surface.

“There’s still a few here. We never get them all. We try, but I can count a few tires in this section of the river right now,” Burchett says.

The group is also planning more clean sweeps later this month. Those exact dates have not been scheduled yet.

For more information on how to volunteer for future clean-ups, click here.

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