Learn about our Beach Sweeps
Flash Sweeps
The Oak Island Beach Preservation Society coordinates a series of short-duration, high-impact beach cleanups through the tourist season. FLASH-SWEEPS are five-minute collections of beach debris at a designated beach access. Volunteers are invited through our website and Facebook page. A Beach Preservation board member provides them with gloves and containers for collecting trash and recyclables. We also provide disinfectant wipes and paper towels. After a brief orientation, they fan out into the access and the beach to collect all they can in just five minutes. They then bring what they collected and we tally what was found.
Photos are encouraged to show just how much can be done in just a few minutes.
Flash Sweeps 2025: May 22, June 2, June 18, July 2, July 18 and August 1
July 28, 2024 – Our fourth "Flash Sweep" had us cleaning the East 40th access with some great volunteers! Thanks for cleaning with us, and be sure to join us for out August 13 sweep!
July 14, 2024 – Our third "Flash Sweep" at East 35th access netted a garden shovel! These are not necessary for the beach! Please limit your beach shovels to the cute little plastic shovels that come with the buckets :)
June 28, 2024 – Our second "Flash Sweep" of the summer was at West 54th access, and we did collect a few pieces of plastic that could harm our wildlife.
SOLO BEACH SWEEPS
Join with the Beach Preservation Society, Inc., to keep the beach clean while distancing! We love doing Flash Sweeps but we are happy to accommodate those who would like to participate in keeping our beaches clean on your own schedule. Let's say BYE to litter on OKI in 4 easy steps – CCPP!
C: COLLECT. Alone or with a few others, collect litter at an access or the beach, for 5-15 minutes.
C: COUNT. Sort the trash into 10 categories on the simple form here.
P: PHOTOGRAPH. Take a picture of the sorted trash and the collectors!
P: POST. Send an email to: OKIBPSI@gmail.com and we will post your pictures and tally sheet on our Facebook Page.
Call your post #litterbyeOKI. We'll create a Facebook Album of the results and compile the numbers for all to see your great work! Add #litterbyeOKI to your posts so we can compile them across other media.
Beach Preservation Inc is really glad the Slimicks' #litterbyOKI sweep removed all this trash from the beach!
SPRING & FALL FULL BEACH SWEEPS
Twice annually, in the Spring and Fall, Oak Island's Beach Preservation Society conducts a full sweep of Oak Island beaches, from McGlamery Street to The Point.
We tally and record the trash collected and share our spring sweep totals with Surfrider Foundation and we share our fall sweep totals with the Ocean Conservancy, in conjunction with the International Coastal Cleanup. Our collection combines with that of other beach lovers around the world. Charting changes in debris types and amounts over the years helps scientists monitor the health of the ocean and coasts. While our Adopt-A-Beach Access parents and other concerned citizens clean up every time they walk the strand, the bi-annual cleanups are the two times of year when we count, classify and share information about the debris we find on the entire beach.
Fall '24 Full 9-Mile Beach Sweep
Our Fall 2024 full beach sweep was another big success! We are grateful to the 38 participants that joined our staff, and endured an overcast day along with a bit of rain at times. Our aim is always to clean the entire 9 miles of beach, and we were able to cover 7 miles at this event. These awesome individuals removed 193 pounds of trash from our beach! Take a look at our tally card which shows what items were collected. As always, cigarettes topped the list with 696 butts collected, followed closely by 532 pieces of plastic (smaller than a quarter).
Spring '24 Full 9-Mile Beach Sweep
We worked together and pulled in quite a haul of this year's spring beach sweep! More construction debris was collected on west beach as well. Here is our tally:
