On Thursday, 28 August, the Portuguese Environment Agency (APA) began the artificial filling operation of sand on six beaches in the Algarve, four in the municipality of Lagoa and two in Albufeira.
The objective is to make the beaches grow to a width of 40 meters of sand, so that bathers move away from the risky strips along the cliffs.
Although there are still many bathers on the beach, these interventions, which will last until mid-November, had to start now, in order to avoid the usual bad weather at sea from that month on.
The feedback operation started at Praia Nova, next to the headland of Nossa Senhora da Rocha, on the coast of Lagoa, where the machines should be working for 12 days to replace 90 thousand cubic meters of sand. Work is done during the day and night.
This is followed by the beaches of Cova Redonda (Lagoa), in the third and fourth week of September, Coelha (first and second week of October) and Castelo (third week of October), both on the coast of Albufeira, Benagil (last week of October ) and finally Carvoeiro, in the first fifteen days of November.
In addition to the replacement of sand, cliff areas at risk on these beaches are also being dismantled.
Sebastião Teixeira, responsible for the APA in the Algarve, explained that "the sand comes from five kilometers from the coast, being deposited at a depth of 20 meters". There it is dredged, then transported by dredger to the edge of the beach and then expelled by large tubes onto the sand. «It is «excellent quality sand», he guaranteed.
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