Posted on August 7, 2017
By Simon Murphy and Mark Wood, mail Online
Dunkirk star Sir Mark Rylance has launched a damning attack on plans to dredge a sandbank that is the final resting place of dozens of Battle of Britain airmen.
The Oscar-winning actor questioned what ‘outcry’ there would be ‘if it was announced France was going to dredge the sands of Dunkirk to make concrete and other construction products’.
Dover Harbour Board wants to dredge Goodwin Sands, off the Kent coast, near Deal, to expand cargo facilities and build a marina.
But at least 60 RAF and German aircraft are believed to have crashed over the ten-mile stretch of shifting sandbanks during fierce aerial battles in 1940. Many of the airmen’s bodies were never recovered.
The sands have also seen more than 2,000 shipwrecks. In the Great Storm of 1703, on one night alone 1,200 men were lost on its banks.
Campaigners say the plan to remove 2.5 million cubic metres of sand and gravel will not only disturb wrecks but will cause coastal erosion and endanger delicate ecosystems and wildlife.
Rylance, 57, said: ‘What is the problem with us, that we are so disrespectful of these honourable souls who perished in the English Channel defending the rest of us from fascism?’
After hearing his remarks, the Port of Dover issued a scathing rebuke, claiming it was ‘inappropriate to compare the Dunkirk Evacuation with a small dredge of the Goodwin Sands – which have been dredged numerous times since the war’.
A spokesman said the ‘sad truth’ was that ‘Dover families, who survived Hellfire Corner [the heavy German shelling and bombing of Dover during the war], could be deprived of the regeneration they’ve wanted for more than 70 years’.
The Mail on Sunday first reported on the campaign against the plans, which has now amassed more than 13,000 signatories to a petition, last year.
Rylance, whose great-grandfather was a resident of Dover and captained cross-Channel ferries, stars in the summer blockbuster Dunkirk as the captain of one of the ‘little ships’ who volunteered to cross the Channel and help evacuate British servicemen from France in May 1940.
Approximately 338,000 men were rescued, but about 3,500 Britons were killed.
Rylance’s comments come as a third consultation is due to be held later this year over the plans to dredge Goodwin Sands.
Joanna Thomson, of the Goodwin Sands SOS campaign, said: ‘It beggars belief that the Port of Dover would accuse Mark Rylance of being inappropriate when they are the ones who want to desecrate these graves.’
The Marine Management Organisation, which is responsible for making a decision over the project, said: ‘The application to dredge the Goodwin Sands is a live application and we are unable to go into detail.’
Source: mailOnline
