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I haven't been to one but I'm wondering how they are - any thoughts?

They were ok a few years back, minus the ogling workers who travel around in groups and stand over top of female sunbathers to get a closer look. I'm not sure about the current state of the water because of the sewage issues. Maybe someone else has more details.

Contaminated

http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?fi ... rldupdates

kanelli wrote:They were ok a few years back, minus the ogling workers who travel around in groups and stand over top of female sunbathers to get a closer look. I'm not sure about the current state of the water because of the sewage issues. Maybe someone else has more details.

I've heard about the workers and in a way I "understand" it being that they probably see no females where they live or work. Frankly I've seen more ogling at private/resort/hotel beaches and not from "laborers"

I've got my own little private patch of sand but it is always good to visit other spots.

-- Fri Nov 19, 2010 8:30 am --

gertrude wrote:Contaminated

http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?fi ... rldupdates

Perhaps I misread the article but it speaks more about dying reef (a problem worldwide - wherever reef still exists) and red-tide from 2008 - the "contamination" seems to be the typical stuff that happens everywhere. Thank goodness for salt...

kanelli wrote:They were ok a few years back, minus the ogling workers who travel around in groups and stand over top of female sunbathers to get a closer look. I'm not sure about the current state of the water because of the sewage issues. Maybe someone else has more details.

The Sewage dumping issues were found to be the illicit practice of privately owned sewage tanker drivers, discharging their loads into the storm drain network in Al Quoz, which in turn discharges into the Persian Gulf, the drivers were not willing to join the tanker queues at the Al Awir treatment plant which was at that time due to the lack of required processing volumes at that plant. The practice was soon stopped and temporary lagoons were established on the outskirts of Dubai to relieve the tanker queues until a new, additional STP was commissioned in Jebel Ali in early 2010.

Unfortunately, the ogling construction staff are still there and not exclusively staring at females

Picture of the poo lagoons mentionned by Dillon, they are not temporary though as they just dug up the 3rd one (south), I think the term "lagoon" is a bit too poetic to describe those huge opened shiet pits and the result of a formidable mistake in planning, blaming the guys carrying the buckets was a too easy short cut. They are just outside Dubai, half a mile from the nearest communities, stench is unbearable, that' s a landmark , visible from space, no one would want to be close to. Note the size compared to the trucks waiting to spew their nasty load.
As of the beach water, salty sludge chemical discharge from the Jebel Ali desalination plant brings up salinity to the highest levels in the world, I dont know if the tourists at the Ritz Carlton have any idea in what soup they are swimming.
Ambassador... at the end of the article somebody mentions that if there is no fish they will import them, that is true, when I was CEO of Exomos, I participated directly to the (quiet) release of hundreds of fish to repopulate the waters, they would float up dead 2 weeks later anyways , at the same time Nakheel was paying marine biologists to claim that corals and marine life was just fine. Another lie now .... exposed.

Dillon I just checked on Google the "new" STP in Jebel Ali, although new, it does not look to me like a treatment plant but another open shiet pit. see the picture.

herve wrote:Picture of the poo lagoons mentionned by Dillon, they are not temporary though as they just dug up the 3rd one (south), I think the term "lagoon" is a bit too poetic to describe those huge opened shiet pits and the result of a formidable mistake in planning, blaming the guys carrying the buckets was a too easy short cut. They are just outside Dubai, half a mile from the nearest communities, stench is unbearable, that' s a landmark , visible from space, no one would want to be close to. Note the size compared to the trucks waiting to spew their nasty load.
As of the beach water, salty sludge chemical discharge from the Jebel Ali desalination plant brings up salinity to the highest levels in the world, I dont know if the tourists at the Ritz Carlton have any idea in what soup they are swimming.

Well as you can see from the bigger picture, the trucks are waiting to ‘spew their nasty load’ into the tanker discharge inlets at the STP, and not into the now redundant lagoons, to which digesters have been added, both natural and chemical, the final phase of the lagoon project will be to process the dried sludge into fertiliser for local farms. Also note, the empty tanker park on the RHS of the picture, at the height of Sewagegate this temporary tanker park was also built to accommodate the waiting talkers and take them off the public roads as they were blocking the roads and roundabouts and were the cause of several road traffic accidents, again redundant since early 2010.



Herewith is a picture, also visible from space, of an installation in Europe dealing with Raw Sewage in open lagoons similar to those in Dubai, the establishment, 240 metres from the nearest sizeable community, is managed by a company called EcoSite, the sewage treatment process is one of many recognised and approved methods of sewage treatment around the world and is popular where economical land mass permits for as you can see it has rather a large footprint of around 4 times that of the Al Warsan lagoons.

I would agree with Herve however, that salinity levels are elevated around the Jebal Ali and Dubal condensate discharge outlets, but I would question what sludge and chemicals are being referring to?

Regards

-- Fri Nov 19, 2010 11:13 am --

herve wrote:Dillon I just checked on Google the "new" STP in Jebel Ali, although new, it does not look to me like a treatment plant but another open shiet pit. see the picture.

This is the Jebel Ali STP Herve sat on a 1km² site between the International Media Zone and the Green Community roundabout on the Emirates Road, the picture you published I know nothing about? I don't even know that it IS an STP?

Regards

I recently visited the public beach at Jumeirah and it was generally clean except for a large quantity of plastic water bottles and general human drift waste that collected around the breakwater. I didn't venture into the water so cannot comment on the salinity or cleanliness.
Not overly busy, but it was a weekday. Police patrols on a regular basis but they tended to stay within the vicinity of the permanent police point rather than ranging along the whole length of the beach, which now has a jogging and cycle track. This was being put to good use by both cyclists and in-line skaters. All-in-all, it was a nice place to go!

Mamzar Park beach is very popular at weekends but someone I know, who goes there regularly, complained that the number of labourers lining up to stare at the women become a gauntlet they had to put up with. The police try to move them on, but have recently given up due to the sheer numbers. This may have something to do with the new developments popping up in the area? The beach is litter picked regularly and they say the water is quite clean.

On the other hand, I also spend some time at an area of reclaimed sand at the end of the beach by the Ritz Carlton Hotel near the base of the Palm. The water is not at all clean, with alternating layers of brown and white scum near the breakwater. I spoke to one or two guys who like to fish off the Palm Jebel Ali and they unanimously say the variety, size and quantity of fish they are now catching is bad compared to just 2 years ago. There are some false reefs created (by sinking old ships) and these improved conditions for a while, but even these have started to decrease.

For truly clean beaches and water, you have to head out to Fujairah. There is a public beach in Dibba and the water quality is very good with still living reef just off the coast.



Knight

Ambassador wrote:
I've got my own little private patch of sand but it is always good to visit other spots.

My daughter used to have her own patch of sand. I used to put a lid on it at night because the cat used to do all sorts of nasties in it. Do you find you have to put a lid on yours too?

Bethsmum wrote:

Ambassador wrote:
I've got my own little private patch of sand but it is always good to visit other spots.

My daughter used to have her own patch of sand. I used to put a lid on it at night because the cat used to do all sorts of nasties in it. Do you find you have to put a lid on yours too?

Bethsmum wrote:

Ambassador wrote:
I've got my own little private patch of sand but it is always good to visit other spots.

My daughter used to have her own patch of sand. I used to put a lid on it at night because the cat used to do all sorts of nasties in it. Do you find you have to put a lid on yours too?

I'm sorry - was that an off topic post?

The beaches are ok actually, there's always loads of kite-surfers wind-sufers, swimmers and wat not. But the workers are still a problem and the latest grip against them is that they randomly go and pick up peoples young children and take photos of them - wrong, wrong, wrong.

But in general the water is alright.

Dillon, very good observation to notice that the pakirng lot was empty of sewage trucks. I keep records of Google pictures and I had noticed that myself. It is your conclusion that is a little off.
The reason why the parking is empty is not because they opened another treatment plant, as you can see there are no trucks either on the Jebel Ali plant.... it is because there are simply less trucks.
Less residents means less trips to the bathroom, less sewage to evacuate.
That is interesting because Dubai Gov is covering up the fact that a lot of people have left Dubai, A LOT. To admit it is not good PR, so the Gov lie about it and say there is still more people coming to Dubai.
But they would not got as far as to put empty sewage trucks on the streets to pretend there is still the same number of residents.
With half of the real estate projects frozen that is a lot of workers that have been sent home.
My conclusion is supported by other datas such lower electric production, and lower output of fresh water.
Thank you for the picture of a treatment plant in Europe, it only reinforces that in europe treatment plants are well engineered, planned and pretty, far away from what the Dubai ones look like, half arse dug up job over night without any engineening or planning, obvious on the pictures.
I have a friend close the Al awil plant, her property is now worthless because of the foul smell.
What comes out of the desalination plant in Jebel Ali, is a highly concentration of saline waste, heat and chemicals, that sludge kills all marine life, and i am sure would affect the health of the tourists if long exposed, because the water is too hot, fortunately they dont swim long in there.

It was utterly disgraceful that the tanker drivers were dumping their sewage into drains, that flowed straight out into the sea and onto the public beaches.

The tankers were always queued back for miles around International City, some sitting there for 12 hours or so - horrific.

Herve, I agree there is less demand today, for Sewage handling by Road Tanker, than there was this time last Year, considerably less, and a significant contributor to the reduced amount of road tankers on Dubai’s Roads as well as DM’s increased processing capacity at the Jebel Ali plant. I think the point here is that the recent problem of the under capacity of sewage processing by DM has now been resolved, and there are no more instances of beaches being polluted by the irresponsible actions of the sewage tanker drivers.

No one is claiming the Sewage Lagoons at Al Warsan were, or are part of a long term plan, they were hurriedly constructed, served their short term purpose and are now being de-commissioned, and Sewage Treatment Plants smell foul wherever in the world they are, open lagoon types as the one I published in Europe, smell worst of all, and they are there permanently, unlike the ones in Al Warsan.

Twice you described the discharge water at Jebel Ali as a chemical sludge;

Dillon wrote:I would agree with Herve however, that salinity levels are elevated around the Jebal Ali and Dubal condensate discharge outlets, but I would question what sludge and chemicals are being referring to?

Do you have any details of the Chemical Sludge Herve?

I don't know the exact nature of the chemicals used in THE Jebel ali plant process, there is no transparency and no Dubai agency will disclose (like they do in the West) the nature and quantity of the chemicals. Basically these chemicals are used to change the composition of the water, clean it from the dead organismes the plant kills in the process, reduce contamination and clogs in the membranes and filters, such as ion chloride, sulfuric acid, sodium hypochlorite, phospinocarboxylic acid , Sodium metabisulphite, nitrilopropionamide, other chemicals are byproduct of corrosion in the systems with other constituents such as boron. Have a good swim Dillon, best chemical soup is off around the Ritz Carlton.
I will have soon, the results of an "independant" and government free analysis, don't ask me how or when, it would not be independant anymore.
The catastrophic and long term effect comes mostly from the brine, highly salty sludge and heat output that kills all marine life, and also oxygen levels dropping with the decomposition of these organismes in the sea.
The Persian Gulf is a closed sea, there is little renewal of ocean water, so contamination can only get worse, and with it, the efficiency of the desalination plants will reduce, increasing even more the contamination.
Now for the sewage problem, the city was built with no design, no plan, as they buil towers and villas, they forgot, or did not give a shiet for a sewer system, there is just not one or too small, hence the buckets on wheels and shiet holes.
Instead of debating beach issues in Dubai, if people like beaches they should just go to the Philipines, Maldives, Australia, Pacific, Caribbean, where beaches are immaculate and stunning. Forget Dubai, it is a contaminated soup. I don't care if you or kid swim in it, it s your skin and it is you who will glow in the dark, but it is a fraud to claim otherwise to attract tourists.

herve it would have been better if you had said that dubai has poisonous jelly fish that bite you where the sun dont shine every morning you would have convinced dillion than

I love the public beaches - I go the one between the Burk al Arab and the Palm (or PJ as I will refer to it going forward). My family & friends really enjoy it each time we go - we don't do much swimming - more eating, doing a bbq'a and a camp fire (thanks to the building slowdown there is plenty of wood to be found on these partially closed sites). Its rare that you can drive on the actual beach in any country - the one I go to has recently installed these small bars which act as a gate but you can still drive to within 20 metres of the water. Really love it - would recommend it to everyone - one of the nice free things Dubai has to offer.

Bah ! I hate beaches and never really found the attraction. I guess if you grow up in a hot country and have always lived not more than 10 mins from it. I guess it looses it charms.

Common DDS - we can both start out portion control and show our trim figure on the beach. Where did you used to live where it was only 10mins away? Or are you talking about here?

Here mate. I've always lived in the UAE. Never been more than a good walk or a short car hop away from the beach and I'm not talking coast line but beach. Never planned it that way but just is.

DDS get yer budgy smugglers on and get down to the beach and put a smile on that clock of yours.