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The Yomiuri Shimbun Yasuhide Kumakawa picks up packs of cigarettes washed ashore on a beach in Nagasaki in August.
By Takashi Nobira / Yomiuri Shimbun Staff Writer
11:53 JST, September 15, 2024
NAGASAKI — Cigarette packs have been found washed ashore in large numbers on coasts in Nagasaki, Kumamoto and Kagoshima prefectures since late July.
The cigarettes are believed to have been made in China, but it is unknown who they originally belonged to. It is possible that they entered the sea from a cargo ship. Since cigarettes cause marine contamination, related municipalities, police and the Japan Coast Guard, are rushing to clean them up.
In late August, packs of cigarettes in various colors, including red, blue and gold, washed ashore in the Sotome district of Nagasaki, on the shore of the Gotonada Sea. Chinese characters were written on the packs, which are believed to be new unopened products. However, the packs absorbed seawater became deformed and gave off a sharp smell.
“No matter how many packs I pick up, there are more,” said Yasuhide Kumakawa while picking up one pack after another and putting them in a garbage bag. The 65-year-old is the head of a citizens’ group working to clean beaches.
The Yomiuri Shimbun Cigarette packs found on coasts
The cigarette packs were first found on a beach in the district in mid-August, and the group reported the incident to the Nagasaki municipal government. Since then, they have collected more than 1,600 packs. “We still have not cleaned all the beaches yet. I have no idea how many packs there are in total,” Kumakawa said.
According to the Nagasaki Customs Office and others, the cigarette packs had been found on coasts in Kagoshima Prefecture since late July. The area where packs have been found has since expanded to about a 350 kilometer-stretch from north to south, including the Amakusa region in Kumamoto Prefecture and the Shimabara Peninsula and Tsushima Island in Nagasaki Prefecture.
“We’ve never seen such a large number of cigarette packs being washed ashore in an area under our jurisdiction,” said Ken Iwasaki, an official at the customs office.
The Ushibuka Police Station in Amakusa, Kumamoto Prefecture, has collected more than 5,000 packs so far. The Ibusuki municipal government in Kagoshima Prefecture said that they have picked up “enough packs to fill two light trucks.” In the remote island city of Goto, Nagasaki Prefecture, approximately 1,500 packs have been confirmed found. Local police, the JCG and residents collect and dispose of them as general waste.
Similar cases in the past
Kagoshima University Project Prof. Shigeru Fujieda suggested that the packs may have been from a shipment, since there is a large amount of a single thing. The expert on “driftology” — the study of how objects drift on ocean currents — said that it is possible a cargo container fell overboard into the sea during transportation, and the items onboard were scattered across the sea.
There have been similar cases in the past. In 2022, large numbers of syringes believed to have been produced in Russia were found on Japanese coasts along the Sea of Japan. They are believed to have fallen overboard while being transported by sea.
According to a paper published in a journal by the Japan Driftological Society, in 2006, a container fell overboard from a cargo ship departing from Tianjin, China, as it passed near Busan, South Korea, and its cargo of ink cartridges fell off the boat and was washed away. As a result, 180,000 ink cartridges ended up washing ashore on the coast of South Korea and another 451 were found on Japanese coasts, mainly on the Sea of Japan side, from Hokkaido to Okinawa.
Regarding the cigarettes, there has been no report from a cargo owner. According to the Nagasaki Coast Guard Office, there have been too many packs to establish a total, and it is possible that tens of thousands of them could have been washed into the sea.
“They will ruin the view, and the more they are scattered, the harder it is to collect them,” Fujieda said. “Collecting and disposing of them is a big burden, but it’s desirable to do so as much as possible.”
The Nagasaki Customs Office has increased vigilance by patrol vessels and collected about 1,000 packs floating in the waters near the Tachibana Bay and the Amakusanada Sea. While there are no signs that the boxes contain drugs or anything else out of the ordinary, the Nagasaki prefectural government has called for people to notify the municipal government if they find any of the cigarette packs.
