A beach in Britain was recently inundated with onions and bags of uncooked french fries that spilled from lost shipping containers.
The cleanup efforts in Eastbourne, United Kingdom, about 78 miles south of London, began last week after the contents of containers that fell into the sea from ships during storms late in 2025 and earlier this month, the East Sussex County Council told CNN.
The bags of onions showed up first on the town’s beach, followed by french fries.
Local resident Joel Bonnici told CNN that while hiking Saturday and helping to clean up the onions, “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.”
Mr. Bonnici described the scene to the BBC as being akin to “the Caribbean golden sands” and added that “in some areas, the chips were two-and-a-half feet deep into the ground.”
The cleanup efforts on the beach were ongoing as of Tuesday, the Eastbourne Borough Council said on social media. The council did not say how much food had been cleaned off the beaches in total or how much still remained.
Volunteers and others were particularly focused on the plastic bags that the fries came in, because seals and other creatures are known to mistake the stuff for jellyfish, the Plastic Free Eastbourne volunteer group said on social media.
His Majesty’s Coastguard told the BBC that as of Friday, “no further containers were spotted offshore,” meaning that no further contents from said containers are expected to wash up in Eastbourne or elsewhere in East Sussex.
