Families evacuated after landslip ‘tears through homes like paper’ | UK News

Families have been forced to leave their homes after a huge landslip caused buildings to ‘tear like a piece of paper’.

Emergency services have evacuated residents in the seaside town of St Leonards-on-Sea, East Sussex, with their houses under threat of complete destruction.

Aerial images of the landslip show the scale of damage caused by the collapsed ground, which has left homes at the bottom of a steep decline directly in the line of fire for falling clumps of soil.

A conservatory sat at the bottom of the cliff has been completely smashed to pieces with debris, bricks and glass scattered across the ground.

Local resident, Jaco, told the BBC that the landslip has severely damaged a historic Victorian building that was previously used as a billiards room.

Jaco said the whole building has been ‘absolutely destroyed’ and ‘engulfed with loose mud and concrete’.

He said that he was ‘really quite scared’ for those who live in the area.

Another resident in the street below said the situation was ‘perilous’ and saw the billiards room being ‘torn open like a piece of paper’.

‘Huge lumps’ of masonry and rubble were ‘thundering down’ onto the land below ‘like a wrecking ball’, he said.

Other locals have said they do not feel safe following the landslip.

East Sussex Fire and Rescue said families were evacuated after the damage was assessed on Wednesday night.

A spokesman said ‘We were called at 8.39pm to reports of a landslip between Marina at the bottom of a cliff and West Hill Road at the top of a cliff in St Leonards.’

They added: ‘Crews liaised with the local council and building control experts. A number of properties at the top of the cliff were evacuated.’

It comes after 13 properties were evacuated earlier this month following two landslides between the same street.

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