Disgusting' Answer Found in Beach Debris Mystery

When thousands of objects believed to have been tar balls washed up on beaches in Sydney, Australia, last month, beaches were closed for days and authorities suspected there had been an oil spill. Scientists, however, tested the dark blobs and determined they weren't tar balls. "What we found is much more—this is not going to sound very scientific—but much more disgusting than we previously thought," says chemistry professor William Alexander Donald, per NBC News. The "tar balls" were lumps of cooking oils, human feces, fatty acids, human hair, and chemicals, similar to the "fatbergs" that clog sewers, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation reports.

"They're consistent with human-generated waste, the sort of thing that you would have in a sewer," Jon Beves, another chemistry professor on the team, tells the ABC. He says they were extremely unpleasant" to work with. "The balls have been sent all over the campus for people to do different sorts of analysis. And yeah, they do smell." The balls also contained traces of prescription drugs, illegal drugs including methamphetamine, and bits of plastic, researchers say.

Researchers say they were unable to determine the exact source of the blobs "due to the complex composition of the balls and the time they have spent in the water," the Guardian reports. Beves believes they accumulated in a pipe that discharges into the ocean somewhere, "possibly through an overflow into stormwater." Authorities in Sydney, however, say there have been no issues reported at local water treatment plants. (More Sydney stories.)