S.C. Department of Natural Resources removes sizable barge from Lowcountry waterway

Officials say 60-foot vessel was an environmental and navigable hazard

By W. Thomas Smith Jr.

The S.C. Department of Natural Resources (SCDNR), under the direction of Dr. Tom Mullikin, has removed yet another abandoned vessel left to decay in shallow water: The latest being a barge (approximately 60 feet long) which has remained abandoned since 2021 near the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway at Wappoo Cut (aka Wappoo Creek) off the coast of James Island, South Carolina.

“When I saw this vessel for the first time I immediately knew it had to come out … and it had to come out now,” said Mullikin, a renowned global expedition leader and retired military officer who today serves as director of SCDNR. “Removing this vessel and others like it which have been abandoned are not simply eyesores: Their removal is absolutely vital to protecting the health of our marshes, waterways, and coastal communities.”

Mullikin added: “As dangerous as this abandoned barge was for the environment, it posed a serious physical hazard for duck hunters and fishermen traveling by boat especially at night who might not have even seen it until they were right up on it.”

Removed May 7, the barge is not the first vessel SCDNR has had pulled from S.C. waters since Mullikin assumed the reigns of SCDNR in Feb. 2025. Numerous derelict or abandoned boats and other surface vessels have been removed in recent years near historic Johns Island, off Hilton Head, and near the coastal city of Georgetown (between Myrtle Beach and Charleston). In August 2025 for instance, a 120-foot abandoned U.S. Navy torpedo-retriever boat from was pulled from Bohicket Creek near Johns Island.

The removal of the decaying torpedo-retriever boat also led to the first arrest made under the state’s recently enacted abandoned boat law, authored and championed by S.C. Senator Chip Campsen.

That law, effective exactly one year ago this month (May 5, 2025), states: “It is unlawful for a person to cause or allow a vessel to become an abandoned vessel or a derelict vessel.” Further, “It is unlawful for a person to intentionally or recklessly cause a vessel to sink on the waters of the State.”

Though deemed a misdmeanor, the penalties are stiff and include heavy fines and imprisonment if convicted.

“We’re not simply pulling these terrible looking, navigably dangerous, environmental threats from our waters,” said Mullikin. “We are pursuing those who left them there to rot.”

What happens to the abandoned vessels once removed? The recently pulled torpedo-retriever boat was subsequently, cleaned, cleared safe, and resunk off the S.C. coast as part of the state’s artificial reef-system benefiting fish and other marine life, anglers, and divers.

– For more information about the S.C. Department of Natural Resources, please visit https://www.dnr.sc.gov/.