Chips ahoy! English beach covered in French fries and onions after cargo ship spill

London (CNN) — A beach in England has disappeared under a blanket of uncooked French fries and onions after a container ship spilled its cargo earlier this month.

A cleanup operation began on Tuesday along the coastline of East Sussex in southeast England after containers on two cargo ships went overboard during storms late last year and earlier this month, according to the local county council.

Joel Bonnici, a resident of the resort town of Eastbourne, told CNN on Monday that he believes the onions began to appear on the shore on Wednesday last week, and some residents went to help collect up the plastic bags in which the onions were packaged.

Bonnici said he and his partner, Trisha, were hiking to see the seals at Falling Sands on Saturday. “Like everyone has been doing to help out, we were picking up the last of the onion bags as we went.”

“We did not expect to turn the corner and see a new scene of chips (French fries) and chip bags stretching across the beach towards the lighthouse,” he said.

“From a distance, you would think the beach was covered in yellow sand like you would see on a tropical island,” Bonnici continued.

“Immediately we both decided the hike was over and we would spend the next couple of hours clearing as many bags as we could until it got too dark to continue. Other families were doing the same and it was nice to see people coming together for the environment,” he added.

‘Thousands of bags’

Environmental group Plastic Free Eastbourne put out a call for more volunteers on Sunday, in a post on Facebook describing “the mess from a shipping container that has spilled thousands of bags of chips and onions all over this vulnerable stretch of land.”

“Seals and other marine life often mistake plastic for food, especially plastic bags which can look like jellyfish in the water,” the group said, adding, “Plastic pollution is a serious threat to the ocean.”

“It is sad that so much plastic pollution is just meters from the seal colony” of 20 to 30 seals, Bonnici said.

“On Sunday, we were so happy to see many local residents responded and came down to help. We cleared loads but still more to do,” he added, warning that those wishing to help should avoid the high tide.

The plastic wrapping for the French fries that washed ashore “has largely been removed by volunteers,” a spokesperson for Eastbourne Borough Council told CNN on Monday.

“Our thanks to the many dedicated volunteers who have been working hard over recent days to help clear debris from our beaches,” the council added.

Other nearby beaches have also been inundated with debris from the latest cargo spill.

“Yesterday we collected 1.9 tonnes of waste from the beach which is nearly 4 times more than we usually collect at this time of year!” Brighton and Hove City Council said in a post on Facebook on Friday.

Salvage company Brand Marine told CNN in a statement Monday that it is providing recovery operations on behalf of the owner of the Lombok Strait container vessel, which lost 17 refrigerated containers of food during a storm on January 8.

“The company is closely cooperating with local authorities and the UK’s HM Coast Guard on the process of locating and salvaging the containers,” it added.

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