More than 3,000 volunteers collected more than 25,000 pounds of trash at 68 cleanup sites across Miami-Dade County during the 40th annual International Coastal Cleanup on Saturday, Sept. 20.
Students, families and volunteers invested their time to join the University of Miami’s Rescue a Reef program to clear 200 pounds of debris from the Rickenbacker Marina shoreline.
The ICC, coordinated by Ocean Conservancy, is the world’s largest single-day cleanup and unites communities in more than 90 countries.
Rescue a Reef, UM’s coral restoration program, gathered students and community members to clear Miami’s shores of debris. Participants were able to log their findings in the CleanSwell app by easily recording each item of trash collected.
For both veterans and first-time participants, the event was about action, awareness and protecting the reefs that make South Florida unique.
Devon Ledbetter, Rescue a Reef’s program manager, said the event was about perspective.
“Today is a lot bigger than Rescue a Reef,” she said to the crowd at Rickenbacker. “We are not just picking up trash, we are contributing to a larger research goal.”
In an interview with the Hurricane, Ledbetter explained the connection between marine debris and coral conservation.
“Plastic that ends up in our beaches and on our waterways do end up having a downstream effect on coral reef health,” Ledbetter said. “There have been studies that show that they can actually communicate diseases that can kill our corals or damage them.”
Rescue a Reef has been involved with ICC for several years, but 2025 marked Ledbetter’s first time leading the event.
With 50 volunteers signed up, the turnout reflected both growing environmental concerns and strong community spirit.
“What makes this event special is that volunteers don’t just remove trash, they contribute data that scientists can use to understand marine debris distribution,” Ledbetter said. “It transforms a cleanup into citizen science.”
That connection between science and action resonated with participants of all ages. For students on the cleanup, this dual mission was motivating.
Reyli Lopez, a Miami-Dade College student attending his first ICC, said the cleanup was about accountability.
“We are taking care of the world we’re living in. Garbage not only affects the animals, but it also affects us,” he said. “It’s crazy to think about the amount of garbage that you pick and the amount of random things you find. Us as humans, we just throw everything to the floor, not thinking how it affects us.”
Long-time volunteer Lucas Folse echoed that sentiment after hauling in heavy debris.
“We found a big lead pipe and a syringe today,” he said. “That’s why cleanups like this are still so important.”
For Folse, joining this event was a way to show his commitment after several years following the work of Rescue a Reef.
“It’s International Coastal Cleanup Day,” Folse said. “It’s a big event that everybody is taking part in, and I just wanted to be a part of it too.”
17-year-old Giovanni Desimone, a reef ambassador who hopes to study marine biology at UM, emphasized the importance of showing up.
“I wanted to help clean up the beach because I know how dirty it is, we all do, and I wanted to help,” he said. “Because I can just sit down on the couch and watch it on TV, but I want to be here, I want to do something.”
Trash was easy to find.
“I was actually climbing over the trees like Tarzan to grab pieces of trash that were just hanging from the trees,” said Desimone.“It was pretty bad.”
Despite being his first ICC event, Desimone already knew he’d be back.
“You’ve got to get your hands dirty. It’s the only way to really understand the problem and be part of the solution,” he said.
By the end of the day, the team had collected 200 pounds of waste making an immediate difference for both the shoreline and international debris tracking. But for Ledbetter, the real value lies in engagement.
“When they realize that they’re doing this for a larger research goal and contributing to ongoing research, it tends to create more of an investment in the issue and increases engagement,” he said.
As the ICC celebrated 40 years, Miami’s community proved that change begins locally. In the words of Desimone: “Be brave, come out here and get some work done.”