A Spanish official has apologized after spraying a beach with bleach, hoping it would protect children from catching the coronavirus.
Tractors sprayed the chemical, typically used to disinfect, on more than two kilometres’ worth of beach area in Zahara de los Atunes last week, the BBC reports, just one day before Spanish children were released from lockdown. “I admit that it was a mistake,” local official Agustin Conejo said, per the BBC. “It was done with the best intention.” Environmentalists have been particularly incensed by the move. “It’s totally absurd,” Maria Dolores Iglesias Benitez, a local environmentalist, told the Guardian. “The beach is a living ecosystem, and when you spray it down with bleach, you’re killing everything you