On the beach at the heart of Bermuda’s sewage problem, one frequent visitor was undeterred yesterday by the ‘grease balls’ that have plagued the area for more than a decade.

In the 26 years since he retired from the vaccine industry, Joe Bawduniak has visited Bermuda thirty times. Staying with his wife at a rental cottage on Grape Bay beach for the eighth time in a row, he said he was surprised he hadn’t learned of the problem sooner.

“We just love [Bermuda]. It’s beautiful, but this is the first time I realised sewage was pumped out just between those two points,” he said, gesturing toward the Seabright sewage outfall location between Grape Bay and Hungry Bay, where up to one million gallons of the city of Hamilton’s waste is disposed of on a daily basis.

Steps to keep the public informed about issues resulting from the Seabright outfall were taken after The Royal Gazette exposed a 2013 study that warned of “intermittent contamination” of south shore during specific weather patterns, creating a “public health hazard” and rendering the beaches “unfit for recreational use”. Government maintains the presence of ‘grease balls’ on beaches “does not necessarily mean the water is contaminated.”

In April, when the sewage balls were first noted coming ashore this year, then Minister for the Environment Trevor Moniz announced plans to introduce an emergency warning system to alert the public whenever sewage was found washing ashore and when pollution levels in the surrounding waters hit dangerous levels.

Although hundreds of small, grey balls of sewage remained on the beach for a second day in a row yesterday, Government officials were unable to “verify” their presence despite photographs taken by The Royal Gazette on Wednesday morning. Queries to Government by this newspaper went unanswered yesterday.

But where Government officials failed, Mr Bawduniak confirmed he saw “three or four” of the so-called “grease balls” after walking the beach yesterday afternoon — adding he “didn’t even know what to look for”.

After first learning of the issue on Wednesday, the Naples, Florida resident said he was “curious to see how they’re going to go about [keeping the public informed]. Are they going to put sirens on poles?”

Government has speculated about using flags or warning signs to alert beachgoers when grease balls are washing up, but yesterday refused to comment when asked what more has been done.

Mr Bawduniak said the presence of sewage on the beach would not deter him from swimming or visiting Bermuda for a thirty-first time, but it could turn off new visitors, as well as pose a health hazard.

“There is a probability — I can’t say how great the probability is — but if someone goes in there with an open wound or some other problem they can pick up very nasty biological [or] pathological bacteria [and become infected].”