Water lovers join forces to clean up Seine River

A group in Winnipeg is working to remove garbage and other hazards from the Seine River. CTV’s Harrison Shin has their story.

If you take a paddle down the Seine River, you might come across more than just Mother Nature.

Garbage and other hazards are clogging up some portions of the urban waterway.

“As the river level fluctuates this year, exceptionally low water levels in the spring, some of the foreign material, like concrete and steel, are exposed,” said David Danyluk, an event organizer for Société Historique Métisse.

That debris causes harm to the boats travelling down the river, he explained, which can lead to thousands of dollars in repairs.

“[The debris] is not what you’d expect to have boats exposed to, and the damage can be pretty severe for thin-skinned boats like fiberglass or cedar strip canoes,” he said.

In June, Société Historique Métisse threw a paddle event at the river, with Mayor Scott Gillingham as one of the dignitaries in attendance.

Paddlers at the event raised the issue to the mayor, informing him of the garbage and hazards in the Seine River.

“The mayor approached us after [the event] and said, ‘I’d like to keep up to date on what’s happening and what we could do to assist,’” Danyluk said.

Now, Danyluk and other rivers lovers are asking for volunteers to help identify the locations of foreign debris in the river.

“We reached out through Facebook, through the paddle community, Kayak Manitoba, Seine River Paddlers, and Paddle Manitoba, to see if any volunteers could help identify these locations and then come back with either hand tools or bigger equipment,” he said.

Danyluk explained the debris is due to the history of the Seine River.

“It was more like a drainage system. So, all of that ancient rubble, it needs to be cleaned enough so that it is safe for paddling,” he said.

“It will be nice to bring people here and show a cleaner river without any of that foreign debris, and to not have [people] worry about their boats being harmed or damaged.”