Storm Ciara which arrived on Sunday February 9 turned out to be all that had been predicted. The whole country was subjected to a relentless battering in varying degrees but we seem to have escaped relatively unscathed compared to many other areas. Locally there were trees down, fence panels blown over and debris swirling around but at Jurys Gap in Camber it was a different story.
There were a few intrepid explorers walking along the coastal sea defences, dog walkers were few in numbers and those who did brave the wind and rain probably wished they had stayed at home as the place looked like a Hollywood film set. The angry sea had already covered neighbouring holiday caravans in a thick coating of fine sand, the tarmac along sections of the main road was invisible, again covered in a thick layer of sand and motorists were stopping to photograph the candyfloss of foam being whipped up by the sea.
There was a thick layer of foam covering the sea defences, the huge granite boulders on the sea side of the wall were nearly unrecognisable, covered in foam which floated through the air, powered by the relentless wind which fired rain drops into our faces, the force of which made them feel like needles.
Sunday presented quite a different picture from the huge expanse of golden sands we all know Camber for. There were very few vehicles in the carpark and even fewer brave souls walking. Spring isn’t far away now and the area will soon be packed with tourists flocking to the dunes but for now, the ferocious sea is in full control and has changed the seascape once more, proving once more that you cant tame mother nature.
Image Credits: Nick Forman .
Nick Forman – Don’t you think “Mother Nature” needs to be saved, not ‘tamed’, by us humans who have caused such world-wide erratic and uncontrollable weather conditions through our lack of foresight and selfish use of fossil fuels and destruction of the environment?
Hi Annabel, thanks for reading Rye News and for your comment and in answer to your question, yes I do. We are all responsible for salvaging what we can of the mess we have made of this planet for ourselves and the next generations, by writing articles about these regular freak weather conditions it helps to bring it home to a wider audience and keeps it in the public eye.
Gosh it really shows you what the stormy seas can do! Amazing photos! As you say generally speaking we were let off lightly compared to other areas! We seem to be experiencing very high tides at the moment a friend went to camber earlier in the week and had to walk on the dunes as the sea had come to the foot of them which I have never heard of before!
It’s also not surprising to see many of the stones used in the recently completed sea defence works at Jurys Gap now forming layers of pebbles on the previously sandy areas on Camber Beach.
At least a third of the beach, mainly by the main car park has now been covered to a depth of at least 9 inches with these stones. I assume Dennis and any subsequent storm will only add to this.
Will this require the Environment Agency to repair the new defences by removing them from the Beach area or are we to expect the nature of the beach to be changed forever?
Ask anyone who lived in Camber during the 50’s and 60’s whether they had problems with sand, before the dunes were planted with grass the sand got everywhere, the shop in the main car park would be buried and the then main road where the Green Owl is would be knee deep in sand.
The sand dunes have always come at a price but Camber has far less trouble now than it did.