Measures to tackle a spillage of millions of tiny plastic pellets into the River Tyne were not deployed until several days after the incident, the BBC has learned. Tonnes of the pieces of plastic, known as nurdles, washed up on north-east England beaches after a collision between two vessels at the Port of Tyne damaged two shipping containers.
Thousands of volunteers have helped with the clean-up operation along the coast. Port of Tyne said it tried to contain the spillage once it knew about it, but a maritime expert has criticised the speed of the port's response and said it should have acted sooner.
The Wind Orca, a wind turbine installation vessel, collided with a berthed container ship, BG Orange, on 19 July. A gantry crane on the quayside collapsed and ended up lying across the ship.
The two containers on the BG Orange were full of nurdles - pre-production plastic pellets, about the size of a lentil, which are used as the raw material to manufacture nearly all everyday plastic goods.
When the containers were damaged these tiny pieces of plastic spilled into the water and eventually washed up on beaches. This prompted a huge volunteer-led clean-up, although North Tyneside Council had asked people not to try to remove the pellets by themselves. Wind Orca's owners, Cadeler, acknowledged the speed of the official clean-up response had
