Southerly winds and currents will push the pellets towards the Cantabrian Sea starting this Sunday, according to the Xunta

Vázquez insists that the central government and opposition tried to "dimension" the spill due to the elections

SANTIAGO DE COMPOSTELA, 14 Ene. (EUROPA PRESS) -

A change in the direction of the winds and the flow of the currents will push the pellets from the lost cargo of the 'Toconao' towards the Cantabrian Sea starting this Sunday afternoon, with which the Xunta predicts that the plastics will "dodge "the Galician coast and head to the coast of Asturias and Cantabria.

This was stated by the second vice president and Minister of the Environment of the Xunta de Galicia, Ángeles Vázquez, in an interview given this Sunday morning to Radio Galega, where she indicated that the estimate is based on the calculations of Meteogalicia specialists. .

Vázquez has indicated that these predictions will be maintained from this Sunday afternoon until Tuesday, days in which it is expected that the spill "mostly" will be directed more towards the Cantabrian coast than the Atlantic.

The person responsible for the Environment in the Galician Government has indicated that, at the moment, the arrival of plastic pellets is concentrated in the Rías Baixas area and "with less intensity" affects the Portuguese Mariña, although the simulations point to that trend change starting this Sunday.

"We continue working because predictions are not easy no matter how many specialists we have. They were right, of course, and we said that there was going to be a change in trend and so it was," said the number three of the Galician Government, who has also reviewed the figures from the operation of the Xunta troops.

In total, 300 people work deployed on 56 beaches, in addition to two helicopters, five ships and seven boats. The balance sheet highlighted the recovery of an entire bag of pellets in Valdoviño (A Coruña) on Saturday, to which is added the location of another in Laxe (A Coruña) that will be removed this Sunday from the rock area where it was sighted.

For Vázquez, these two bags of pellets recovered from the water without breaking refute the Xunta's position that the central government should get involved in acting at sea to prevent the wrappers from breaking and disintegrating the load through the water.

The vice president has once again ruled out the need for ground resources from the Central Administration because and has emphasized that it is necessary to "dimension" the problem that she believes has been tried to be used by the opposition parties in Galicia as an element to try to get votes for the regional elections.

"I think we have to size up this problem, which affects a very small part, thank God, of our beaches, because we have a total of 960 beaches and so far, let's look at it, they have collected and reached about 56," he stated. before denying that the Parque Nacional das Illas Atlánticas and Corrubedo have been affected by the spill.

"There are elections around the corner and someone wanted, apart from sizing up the problem, not to act, to hide and, on top of that, to make a mess of this situation. Therefore, until now we do not believe that more operations on the ground are necessary," he stated.

Thus, in an interview in which she once again showed her willingness to collaborate with the investigation opened by the Prosecutor's Office with the desire that "the truth" be known, the number three of the Galician Executive has insisted that the demands to the Government , which he accuses of hiding "information", focus on using marine robots to locate the lost container, sealing it and demanding responsibilities from the shipping company responsible for the 'Tocoano'.

He states that the insurer of this company has not contacted the Xunta and has announced that this Monday the commission of experts on ecotoxicity will be launched, whose composition will be announced on Tuesday. In any case, he has once again stressed that the reports available to the Galician Government, made in collaboration with Galician universities, determine that the pellets are not toxic and do not constitute a threat to health.