A strange phenomenon has seen hundreds of dead starfish being washed up on a beach in a popular seaside town.
The aquatic creatures, which live on seabeds across the world's oceans, were spotted in the sand in Palm Bay near Margate, Kent by residents and tourists last weekend.
Such incidences have happened along the southeast coast in the past, particularly after bouts of bad weather.
In 2009, 2010, and 2011, thousands of sea creatures, including crabs, starfish, lobsters, sponges and anemones, washed up on beaches following severe weather.
And in 2018, after a week of freezing temperatures and stormy weather, thousands of starfish, fish and sea urchins, covered the beaches in Ramsgate in one of the biggest mass strandings on record in the UK.
Speaking at the time, Andrew Cabrinovic, curator of echinoderms at the Natural History Museum, said the most likely explanation was stormy weather, while changing tides, high winds and sea swell could also play a part.
He added: "Starfish strandings such as this one are not unusual, and occur to a greater or lesser degree every year. However, strandings on this scale do not happen often."
Starfish live on the soft, sandy parts of the ocean floor and are easily picked up by waves, so when water currents become stronger with choppy conditions, they wash to the shore.
Local resident Robert Kemp made the grim discovery on Saturday while walking along Palm Bay beach.
He told Isle of Thanet News: "I was on Palm Bay beach when I saw lots of starfish that had been washed up, I’m talking in the hundreds, possibly thousands."
A similar occurrence happened when locals at a beach in Marske-by-the-Sea, North Yorkshire were greeted by thousands of dead sea creatures in March.
Photographer Sharon Bell was walking her dog there this morning and one of the first to find the dead littered across the sand.
Thousands of dead fish, crabs, lobsters, clams and starfish had all washed ashore, dead, YorkshireLive reported.
Sharon said this has marked at least the third time in the past 12 months that masses of dead sea creatures have washed ashore.
"I thought, no – not again," she said.
She added: "I'm really concerned this has started up again. Personally, I don't think enough testing has been done."
She added that larger than normal numbers of dead marine animals – including dolphins and porpoises – have been a regular sight at Marske since October 2021, shortly after deep dredging at Teesport began.
In October, last year, thousands of crustaceans and molluscs washed up dead on the North Yorkshire coast, sparking a Defra investigation.
The government department concluded a natural algae bloom was the most likely cause although many fishermen and coastal residents have disputed this.
