Moment huge chunk of rock on Jurassic Coast comes crumbling down on remote beach

Huge landslide on Jurassic Coast sends tons of rock crumbling down on remote beach after recent heavy rain left cliffs unstable

  • The shocking landslip occurred on the coast at Seatown near Bridport, Dorset, on Saturday 
  • Recent heavy rain made porous sandstone that makes up the 180 million-year-old cliff substantially weaker
  • Hundreds of tons of mud fell onto a remote area of the beach which luckily does not attract many visitors 

Advertisement

This is the shocking moment a huge chunk of Britain’s Jurassic Coast came crumbling down onto a remote stretch of beach.

The landslip occurred on the coast at Seatown near Bridport, Dorset, on Saturday after recent heavy rain made the porous sandstone that makes up the 180 million-year-old cliff substantially weaker.

Hundreds of tons of mud and earth fell onto a remote area of the beach which luckily does not attract many visitors.

The landslip occurred on the coast at Seatown near Bridport, Dorset, on Saturday after recent heavy rain made the porous sandstone that makes up the 180 million-year-old cliff substantially weaker

A crew member from Lyme Bay Rib Charter captured the moment the landslip occurred after noticing some smaller rocks starting to move.

Richard Edmonds, a freelance geologist from Lyme Regis, said the landslip is a continuation of another massive fall that happened in April this year.

He said: ‘I think it was inevitable because there have been cracks developing up there since April.

A crew member from Lyme Bay Rib Charter captured the moment the landslip occurred after noticing some smaller rocks starting to move

Richard Edmonds, a freelance geologist from Lyme Regis, said the landslip is a continuation of another massive fall that happened in April this year

A crew member from Lyme Bay Rib Charter captured the moment the landslip occurred after noticing some smaller rocks starting to move

Hundreds of tons of mud and earth fell onto a remote area of the beach which luckily does not attract many visitors

Hundreds of tons of mud and earth fell onto a remote area of the beach which luckily does not attract many visitors

‘We have had a lot of heavy rain fall on layers of porous sandstone and the water has seeped through that but not the clay behind it and the water has built up and up and that has made the cliff weaker.

‘It is a bit like dunking a biscuit in a cup of tea. It gets weaker and weaker until it crumbles.

‘Landslips like this start off slowly and then accelerate which is probably why someone managed to get this one on camera.’

Advertisement