Swimmers have been left furious after 'thousands' of nails and sharp objects were scattered across a Tynemouth beach.
Groups of swimmers who arrived at King Edward's Bay for an early morning swim on Sunday were shocked to discover that the sand had been littered with nails, screws, wires and batteries.
Mallory Smith was at the beach for a dip at around 7am when she was alerted to the dangerous objects by a fellow swimmer. She joined other members of the public in collecting as many of the sharp objects as they could before alerting the police.
READ MORE: Health workers pull Millennium Bridge stunt in campaign against nuclear weapons
The 69-year-old member of the community group, Totally Tynemouth, who was involved in the morning's clean-up efforts, said it was shocking to see. "There are thousands of nails there," Mallory said.
"People have no idea where they came from. Someone said it looked like roofing nails.
"They are not just one or two but thousands of them. They looked like brand new nails.
"Some were an inch long and if they were pointing upwards and someone put their foot down on them it could have been pretty nasty. Lots of people were picking them up and collecting bags and bags full.
"Some of the bags were too heavy to carry. I made a report at 9.30am to the police and dropped one of the bags off at Silverlink Police Station."
Mallory, who has written a children's book called Maloula the Mermaid about the environmental impact of litter on sea life, continued: "People are just furious and upset. Lots of people come down with their kids and we were trying to say to the parents to watch their children's feet.
"Hopefully no one was hurt."
ChronicleLive has contacted Northumbria Police for comment.
READ NEXT:
