Family run for their lives as terrifying rockfall on Dorset beach sends hundreds of tonnes of shale rock, mudstone and limestone tumbling to the ground

A family was forced to run for their lives today after a massive rockfall covered the beach they were walking on in hundreds of tonnes of shale rock, mudstone and limestone.

Elizabeth and Ronald Downes were with their two grandchildren, son, daughter and their son-in-law and daughter-in-law on Charmouth Beach in Dorset when the cliff suddenly collapsed.

The group had to split up and run in different directions to escape the hundreds of tonnes of falling shale rock, mudstone and limestone.

Mr Downes, 58, and Mrs Downes, 56, were cut off from the rest of their family in the dramatic incident that left the children distraught and in tears.

Mrs Downes, from Danbury, Essex, said: 'My family were on the beach at the time the rockfall happened. We got separated and had to run - it came down like a domino effect.

'We have been very shook up and frightened - we were running for our lives - we could have been killed.

'We got separated from our grandchildren, they were hysterical and crying, they didn't know if we had lost our lives. We were all so frightened and running like crazy.

'We come every year and we are well aware of the dangers and to not go near the cliffs. We were also worried as the tide was coming in.

'We were warning people on our way back to the car as it was still coming down.'

She said the family has been visiting the Jurassic Coast for 27 years to hunt for fossils and knew the dangers of the unstable cliffs there.

Mr Downes and Mrs Downes' daughter, who didn't want to be named, added: 'We are very cautious because we know the dangers. We were walking along the sea line looking for fossils there, away from the cliff.

'I remember as a kid my dad always said if you hear what sounds like a rustling bag of peas, look up and run.

'I heard what sounded like a bag of peas, it sounded really light, just like sand trickling down.

'I looked up and saw this very fine dust and knew straight away. I screamed "look up, run" and the top of the cliff just dropped down and everything came at us.

'Mum and dad were in front and ran forwards and we ran back along the beach. It was absolutely horrific, especially with young children. My husband was running with one of the children and I was dragging the other by the hand.

'Big boulders were coming down and we were trying to outrun the cracking as it's falling. It came all the way out to the sea line.

'We were both unlucky and lucky. If I wasn't educated about rockfalls and if I hadn't known that was a warning sign, I don't believe we would have got out of that.

'If we had been closer to the cliff we would have been dead.'

Staff at the Charmouth Heritage Centre arrived at work on Sunday morning to find the aftermath and warned people to stay away as there were rocks still falling throughout Sunday.

Phil Davidson, a palaeontologist at the centre, said it's very dangerous and people should stay well away from the exposed cliff line.

He added: 'All the rain we have had this winter and spring is seeping through the mud and clay, we will probably end up with some more landslides.

'As it's a fresh fall it will be sticky if you try and climb over it, and you could twist an ankle and get stuck.

'People should also check the tides as there is a danger of getting cut off from the tide.'

The rockfall happened at about 7.30am on Sunday.

On Friday evening a 14-year-old boy had to be rescued from the same cliff after getting stuck 40ft up while looking for fossils.

Two teams of coastguards and two fire crews had to attend to get the boy safely down.

In 2012, tourist Charlotte Blackman, 22, was crushed to death when a similar landslip occurred as she walked under the cliffs at Burton Bradstock.

And a huge 30ft boulder collapsed just yards away from walkers in March at the nearby West Bay.

The cliffs along the Jurassic Coast have been incredibly unstable with the recent bad weather and there have been a number of rockfalls and landslides in the last month.

They are some of Britain's most iconic views and stand at 140ft tall and are more than 180 million years old.

Recent extreme weather has seen huge chunks of rock fall onto the beach around Burton Bradstock.

Images of the rockfall show boulders the size of double-decker buses resting on top of a 50ft pile of debris.

The area, which is where the popular ITV show Broadchurch was filmed, experienced significant rockfall after a battering from Storm Kathleen, which saw 600 tonnes fall off the cliff face.

The cliffs are made up of sandstone rock that is porous and acts like a sponge with rainwater which seeps down through and weakens the stone over time.

At the same time, strong waves whipped up by storms batter the base of the cliffs which also destabilises them.

Some geologists believe the rockfalls are a consequence of global warming.