Life jacket mountains are swelling in Lesbos as hundreds of thousands of refugees passing through the island in Greece. According to United Nations refugee agency, up to 3,400 refugees make it on shore of Lesbos every single day, transported by deflated rubber dinghies and inflatable pool floaties. From there, they head for safety in the Europe, leaving the life jackets behind.

“We think there are at least 450,000 life jackets [and other floating devices] on the island now… one for each person,” said the spokesman for the Mayor’s office in Mytilene, capital of Lesbos. The number of floating devices left behind in the waters or near the shore remained unknown.

The life jackets now form 5-meter-high piles occupying an area of over 40,000 square meters near Molyvos, a village in Lesbos. The island once booming for tourism is turning into a monument of peace, hope, and desperation, symbolized by the brightly-orange life jackets.