Some situations are simply unacceptable. That’s how Abigail Frost-King sees it.

In 2000, she bought a house near Anthony Boulevard, a place with a backyard that bordered the Maumee River. The property map identified the area as Maumee riverbank, anyway, but Frost-King wasn’t so sure.

“I thought I bought a house next to a dump site because there was so much trash,” she recalled.

The president and founder of Save Maumee Grassroots Organization decided she couldn’t count on anyone else to tackle the trash. She had to get involved. And she knew she would get more support from elected officials if she formed a group.

Frost-King and her fellow Save Maumee members spent a soggy Saturday removing debris from the St. Marys River and its riverbanks, the organization’s 11th annual cleanup effort. Since 2005, the group has removed more than 32,000 pounds of trash from the three local rivers.

“This is kind of a fun event, because usually we plant trees and remove invasive species,” which is harder work, Frost-King said.

About three dozen people participated by walking along the riverbank filling large plastic bags with trash and taking canoes out onto the water to remove items found floating there.

Lorali Hart, a third-grader, was in the first canoe out Saturday morning. The local 8-year-old found milk jugs, water bottles and liquor bottles floating in the water.

“It was a lot of plastic,” she said.

Alissa Hart, Lorali’s mother, said the pair have found some surprising things during their volunteer river cleanup stints in recent years.

“Once we found a meth lab,” she said. “We called the police to come and get it.”

Aaron Goulet has participated in the cleanup effort since 2011. The waters are considerably cleaner since then, when years of accumulated trash included discarded washers, driers and mattresses.

“The first few years we’ve done this, we were taking dumpsters (full) of trash out of here,” he said. “And now we’re down to a trailer” with trash bags tossed into the back.

Star Light, another volunteer, has an almost mystical relationship with nature.

“The coolest thing, you find, is if you pick up enough trash, the spirit rewards you with something you’ve been wanting,” she said, describing finding discarded treasures.

Frost-King signed in volunteers Saturday and offered them coffee, doughnuts, bananas, juice and, she noted with particular emphasis, reusable water bottles.

“We do it because we care,” she said of the river cleanup. “We want to be the example for others – and make it fun.”

sslater@jg.net

Officials are cleaning up more than 8,000 gallons of turbine fuel that leaked into the St. Marys River in Decatur after a pipeline failed to contain the pollutant, officials said Saturday.

Cleanup started immediately after the leak was discovered at 5:17 p.m. Friday, according to Buckeye Pipe Line Co. L.P., which is responsible for the leak.

Booms were set up in the St. Marys River to contain the turbine fuel, also known as jet fuel. Several roads were also closed, including Monmouth Road near the city’s wastewater treatment plant, officials said.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said it is monitoring air in neighborhoods and businesses near the river. The EPA said it is also monitoring water quality at several locations downstream.

No fires or injuries were reported, Houston-based Buckeye Pipe Line said, and the pipeline will remain shut down until it is repaired and considered safe to reopen.

“One of their workers discovered a pressure drop, went immediately to check on it and immediately shut it down,” said Bernie Beier, Allen County Homeland Security director. Beier was monitoring cleanup activities by several contractors hired by Buckeye at the Allen County-Adams County line.

Beier said that while the booms contained the pollutant so it could not spread, contractors were using hoses to vacuum the fuel off the top of the water.

“So the goal is to get as much of the product or the fuel off the top of the river before the rains get heavier, the waters rise and the currents get faster,” Beier said. “When the water becomes more turbulent, anything off the top tends to get sucked down with logs, sticks and debris.

“And they’re really making great progress, they’re getting a lot of fuel off the water,” Beier added.

Decatur Mayor Kenneth L. Meyer said crews worked through the night to clean up the spill. He said there was an odor in the air, “but it’s not toxic.” The cleanup could take weeks, Meyer said.

“Buckeye and its employees are an integral part of the local communities in which we operate,” a statement from the company said. “Our primary concerns are protecting the safety of the public and the environment.”

As crews were busy cleaning up pollution on the St. Marys River near Decatur, volunteers from the Save Maumee Grassroots Organization had their annual fall cleanup on the St. Marys near the Wells Street Bridge in downtown Fort Wayne.

Hearing about the fuel spill, Abigail Frost-King, president of the Save Maumee Grassroots Organization, thought of a West African proverb.

“Filthy water cannot be washed,” she said, quoting the proverb. “I don’t want there to come a time when things are too polluted that it may be too late.”

jduffy@jg.net