Timber washes ashore at Ramsgate

On Monday night a cargo ship shed its 1,500 tonne load of timber into the sea and over the last couple of days it?s been washing up on the Thanet coast where I live. This morning I had the chance to pop down the seafront with my camera and took quite a few snaps as I?m not sure how long it will all remain there due to either the official clean-up or those opportunists who have been cleaning-up for themselves.

There were quite a few private company vans, trailers, etc down there loading wood, and I wasn?t sure if they?d been brought into help or were there to salvage some building materials but Alison Kentuck, Receiver of Wreck said:

?The timber is not suitable for building material, it is saturated with salt water.

The simple message is, it is not a case of finders keepers. The timber does have an owner and that is not likely to be the person picking it up off the beach.

They must by law report all of their recoveries to the receiver and it is a criminal offence if they fail to do so.?

Anyway here are the photos:

Update: Just read this article from the Guardian which says:

Insurers for the ship have appointed contractors to recover the wood. They are working alongside teams from Thanet council to remove the washed-up wood. It has been gathered into piles and is guarded by police.

So it wasn?t dodgy builders taking wood, but rather they were contracted to do so, although I?m sure that the guy I saw putting it on his roofrack wasn?t anything to do with this!