Water-Related News

FGCU Water School: Floating chunks in Caloosahatchee are ‘normal’

FORT MYERS – In the Caloosahatchee River along the George Town neighborhood in Fort Myers, there’s something in the water.

A viewer first told NBC2 about it, sending in photos that showed a dark matter not far from the river’s edge. The viewer wondered if it might be sewage.

The NBC2 Investigators went to check it out, and we found greenish-brown chunks floating in the river and nearby canal.

After snapping a couple photos, we used a bottle to scoop up a sample of the chunks from the water. The next day, we took that sample to Barry Rosen of the FGCU Water School so he could take a closer look under a microscope.

It didn’t take him long to reach a conclusion.

“This is all normal, healthy,” Rosen said while looking at an extreme close-up of the sample.

Rosen said it was made up of sand and what he called ‘normal, healthy algae’ from the bottom of the river. Certainly not sewage.