Divers pulled 3,000 pounds of trash from a lake near Tahoe. Here's what they found

After scouring one mile of the lake’s 7-mile shoreline down to 25 feet of depth, the crew has pulled out 3,000 pounds of refuse, including about 100 car tires.

“This is the dirtiest mile we’ve found yet,” said Colin West, founder and executive director of Clean Up The Lake, the Tahoe nonprofit coordinating the effort.

Over three days this fall, in addition to pulling up countless beer cans and glass bottles, West’s crew of 16 volunteers also discovered what they believe to be the remains of a 100-year-old Ford Model T automobile: four narrow tires, a chassis and an engine block resting on the silty lake bed.

“That was a cool one,” West said.

However, items older than 50 years — even something as mundane as a rusted tin can — can’t be removed during these excursions, West said. They need to be tagged and reported to the state, which then assesses them for historical significance. So divers left the old Ford in its place.

Located at the base of Mount Tallac in South Lake Tahoe, Fallen Leaf attracts sunbathers to a sandy expanse on its north shore and some fishers as well, but boating and lodging there is meager compared to its massive neighbor, Lake Tahoe. Its lowest point is about 415 feet deep — shallower than Lake Tahoe’s 1,645 feet.

Riding the momentum of a well-received underwater cleanup along Tahoe’s 72-mile shoreline last year, West’s group has launched cleanups at Fallen Leaf and Donner Lake in Truckee. It is also surveying lakes in the Eastern Sierra for possible future cleanup programs, West said.

West had hoped to knock out Fallen Leaf quickly but says removing the amount of junk apparent in the lake is going to require more volunteer hours and funding if it’s going to be completed before winter arrives.

“We’re only a mile in and it’s a rigorous, tough job,” he said. “But the lake is also beautiful and it’s throwing out some interesting finds.”