Saltburn protest held over dead crustaceans and sea pollution

A protest has been held in Saltburn after crabs, lobsters and other marine life washed up along part of the North East coast.

Thousands of carcasses have been seen in Redcar, Seaton Carew and Saltburn in the past few weeks.

The Environment Agency ruled out sewage as the cause and said the investigation was "top priority".

Edith Reeve, from Saltburn Against Sewage, said it was "heart-breaking" and they "just want answers".

Local surfers, swimmers and environmentalists from Make Our Oceans Great Again and Surfers Against Sewage turned out to highlight the issue of sea pollution.

The protesters joined demonstrations around the world calling for urgent action on climate change.

Organiser Edith Reeve, from Saltburn Against Sewage, said: "We've had hundreds of crustaceans washing up dead on our beaches.

"Nobody seems to have any idea what is causing it. We're all crying out for answers. The smell is awful on the beach from all the dead, rotting crabs and lobsters and fish; it's just awful."

Rachel Caldwell, Environment Agency North East area environment manager, said: "It is really, really distressing, so as you can imagine, this is one of our top priorities here in the North East and we've got a number of organisations working on this."

Seismic activity and underwater cables have also been ruled out as a cause and samples are still being analysed, the agency added.

"I swim a lot in the sea and a lot of the sea swimmers here are reluctant to go in because they don't know what's causing the crustaceans' deaths," Ms Reeve said.

"We've also had sewage poured out of our local sewage outflows this week as well because of the rain. We've spoken to Northumbrian Water about this previously... their feedback has not been good enough, their systems are not good enough.

"You come down and there's human faeces all over the beach, towels, tampons and baby wipes and it's really vile.

"So a lot of the local people here are angry that we're not being told what is going on with the crabs, we're angry that the water companies aren't taking the sewage situation seriously."

A spokesperson for Northumbrian Water said: "We are aware of the concerns raised by customers in the Saltburn area and share their passion for our region's coastline.

"We know that our customers demand even better and we will continue to work to keep improving, both for them and for our environment."

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