The bad news never ends... now even our white cliffs are crumbling
RISING magnificently from the sea, they have been a proud symbol of Britain for thousands of years.
But in what some might see as a bad omen, it seems that even our fabled white cliffs have become victims of these uncertain times.
This was the unhappy scene yesterday after some 50,000 tons of chalk and earth crashed into the sea without warning at a popular walking spot.
The cliffs at Seaford Head in East Sussex were hit by two unexpected collapses in two days.
The first happened on Wednesday, taking a huge section of the coastline with it. Yesterday there was another collapse, with aerial photos showing a massive pile of rubble at the bottom of the cliff.
And a huge crack could be seen down the side of the cliff, prompting fears of a third landslide.
Emergency services launched a major search on Wednesday after the first collapse.
The rubble fell into the sea in three stages during a three-and-ahalf-hour period on the hottest day of the year as sunbathers lay on the nearby beach.
Coastguard teams and Sussex Police took part in a four-hour search before they were satisfied that no one was hurt. Witness Angie McKenna said: ‘It just shows how unstable Seaford Head cliffs are. I can only imagine how scary it would’ve been for people close by.’
Yesterday rescue teams launched a similar operation after the second landslide. The emergency services issued an urgent appeal for information about a woman in a pink top who was seen near the cliffs when they collapsed. She was later found uninjured.
Officials started to issue regular warnings to walkers in 2014 after a huge crack appeared down the side of a cliff face.
Seaford Town Council clerk James Corrigan said: ‘It was inevitable there would be further falls over the course of the next couple of weeks. We could see from examining the cracks [on Wednesday] there were going to be further falls – it’s not a surprise but we didn’t know it was going to be today. This one started further along the coast and it’s a comparable size.’
Further along the coast a woman fell to her death at Cuckmere Haven, between Seaford and Eastbourne, yesterday afternoon.
Emergency services were called at 2.22pm and found her body at the bottom of the cliff shortly before 5pm. It remains unclear how she fell or whether the collapse of the Sleaford cliffs had anything to do with her death.
‘Imagine how scary it was’