Emergency Biohazard Cleanup Near Andalucia Apollo Beach, FL

Apollo Beach is an unincorporated waterfront community and census-designated place in Hillsborough County, sitting on the eastern shore of Tampa Bay between Tampa and Bradenton.

Apollo Beach began in 1923 on land owned by the Dickman family, which was then used for farming and grazing and was largely mangrove and low-lying land considered uninhabitable.

In the 1930s Paul Dickman conceived the idea of a waterfront community here and hired a Miami engineering firm to design a subdivision with roads, canals, schools and recreation areas.

After a failed 1950s development attempt under the name Tampa Beach, retired Michigan businessman Francis Corr bought the land in 1957, and in 1958 his wife Dorothy suggested the name Apollo Beach in honor of the area's abundant sunshine.

Apollo Beach is laced with about 55 miles of dredged canals, so a large share of its homes sit directly on the water with access out to Tampa Bay and the Gulf of Mexico.

Apollo Beach grew explosively in the 2010s - the Census counted 26,002 residents in 2020, up from 14,055 in 2010, after the community had already counted 5,886 households back in 2010.

Tampa Electric's Big Bend Power Station stands on the northern end of Apollo Beach, on land sold to the utility in the early 1960s.

Apollo Beach is home to Tampa Electric's Manatee Viewing Center, where hundreds of manatees gather in the power station's warm discharge canal whenever Tampa Bay's water drops below 68 degrees - a record 2,100 manatees were counted there on a single cold day.

The discharge canal at Apollo Beach is a designated state and federal manatee sanctuary, and the free viewing center - part of a 500-acre conservation campus with a 50-foot observation tower - is open each year from November 1 to April 15.

Apollo Beach Nature Preserve protects 63 acres of tidal marsh, dunes and mangrove swamp, with a beach, nature trails and picnic shelters for residents.