Debris from last week's ships collision on the North Sea has washed up on Skegness beach.
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00:00The devastating sight of burnt debris from one of the ships that collided in
00:05the North Sea last week is littering Skegness Beach this morning. John Byford
00:10was one of the first to witness it.
00:14It's a very sad sight to see. This bag is mine, the green bag, but I've just been
00:20collecting items from this washed up boat, you know, from what's been washed up
00:26and it almost looks like coral, but what it is, it's absolutely thousands of small
00:32pellets that look like eggs almost and whilst we can clean this up off the
00:38beach, it's the damage it's going to do to the environment out in the water and
00:42the, you know, this looks like food to, you know, to fish and as you can see if I
00:48just take a few steps, you're finding burnt, this is burnt, again it's a big
00:55lump of plastic, you can't see it, you know, I can smell it here, you can only
01:00see it, but the smell is, you know, of a burnt petrol type smell which is
01:06obviously, you know, coincides with what happened in, you know, out in the North
01:11Sea, but everywhere I'm walking, Chrissie, it's here, you see, it's big chunks of
01:18plastic and if I can get a close-up you can see it's, you know, a little bit
01:23bigger than a piece of rice, how I would describe it, but it's tangled up in, as
01:31you can see, I've got a piece of rope here, you know, just some, what everyday
01:36normal beach, you know, this is a sort of typical item that you'll find on the
01:40beach on a daily base, bit of wood, but in amongst it now is this, and so which
01:49part of the beach are you on? I'm at the moment, I'm about half a mile south of
01:57Skegness Pier, heading towards Gibraltar Point, it's a, you know, it's an
02:03absolutely gorgeous morning when you look out to sea, you know, and it's
02:07gorgeous, but when you think of what's in that water right now and the damage
02:10it's doing, it's absolutely frightening, and even as I'm talking to you, you know,
02:15you see little bits washed up, sad to see, very sad, but we can clean it up, but it's
02:23how we're going to clean up the sea, that's the biggest issue, we just hope
02:27that it all gets washed ashore, you know, I'm sure in the coming days that we're
02:34going to see a lot more dead wildlife, you know, fish being washed up, I'm
02:38almost certain of it, it's got, you know, you can't have this much plastic being
02:43washed up, you know, and this smells, this smells, it smells really bad.
02:49Okay, can you smell it on the beach? Yeah, I mean, if I put this to my nose now,
02:56smells like you're in a petrol station filling up with fuel, that's what it
03:00smells like, benzene almost, that benzene smell. I mean, after the, yeah, after the
03:05collision, there were reports that people could smell fumes along the coast. Has that gone now?
03:14See, we've got our bracing winds today, and obviously that's shifting the
03:19smell somewhat, but when you get near to one of these larger chunks, yes, you can
03:24smell it, and, you know, the closer you get, you know, that smell becomes more
03:29prominent, but it's, it's not good, but we've all got to work together on
03:34this one. As you can see, that's my little collection, you know, just from a 20-yard
03:41walk, so, and some of them, you know, they almost look like pieces of coral. If you
03:47look at that, if I can get it in the light, you know, it's like a lump of coral.
03:53I'm gonna have to wash my hands afterwards because I've got no gloves on.
03:57I think you absolutely are, and we'll clearly get more guidance on, on how bad
04:05this is as it goes on. Yeah, well, I'm gonna go and wash my hands, and I will wash my hands now, and, but yeah, it's, it's, it's very, very sad to see this, and I just hope that
04:19there's not too much impact, you know, on, on what Skegness relies on, and that's
04:24visitors and tourism, and, you know, there is going to be a clean-up operation
04:31required, but it's, you know, we're not talking oil slick now, we're talking, you
04:36know, hard lumps, you know, and some of them big lumps that need clearing up.