Cornish locals have slammed ‘idiot’ holidaymakers who had to be rescued by lifeguards after driving on to a beach and getting stranded in their cars.

Lifeguards could be heard on the loudspeaker warning the tourists to not park on the beach, however the announcement came too late to save the cars from sinking into the soft sand. 

Comical footage showed four cars stuck on Towan Beach in the popular tourist town of Newquay after the motorists decided to ignore conventional parking spots and drive their vehicles right on to the sand.

In the video, a group of bemused surfers can be seen walking past the cars on their way to the water as a lifeguard tries to remedy the all-too-familiar situation for locals.

Connor Duffy, 33, a chef from Newquay, said the ‘idiot summer’ had begun after he spotted the vehicles recklessly making their way on to the beach. He said motorists made the same mistake at least once a week despite road signs warning them to stay off.

Thousands of tourists visit Newquay every summer for its excellent surfing and lively nightlife, but locals aren’t always best pleased with how they treat their town. 

Mr Duffy explained how the motorists all drove down together, but it did not look like they knew each other.

He added: ‘They then had to get two RNLI trucks to leave their posts of lifeguarding to come and sort them out. They had to be pulled out by locals as no tractors could be called in.

‘Then they had to clear the ramp as they each took turns at speeding up the beach and onto the ramp without getting stuck again.

‘Lifeguards tried to sort it as quickly as possible, and did so.’

Mr Duffy said a crowd soon gathered and were seen chanting ‘you can do it!’ before cheering when the cars were finally removed from the deep sand and taken up the ramp.

He added: ‘Just shows common sense isn’t really that common. Happens at least once a week now due to tourists not reading the signs and thinking that they are fine to do so.

‘It’s the same with the bins on the beaches, tourists put still-burning coals in the bin and set it on fire.

‘Fire engines are down all the time over the summer because people don’t know how to go to the beach, safely. Shame really.

‘But this was funnier to watch than anything too serious. Some say entitled people, but it was just a bunch of silly people who don’t think very hard.’

It comes less than a week after another ‘idiot’ tourist parked their £25,000 Mercedes GLe SUV on the sand in Newquay as well.

The car was eventually towed off the beach by a local tractor and taken to a local garage. 

Further up the south-west coast in Devon, more motorists found themselves in trouble after torrential rain left them unable to move their cars.

The North Devon Show was forced to close its car parks and cancel the event yesterday due to health and safety concerns.

Pictures of the car park show tractors assisting vehicles unable to move from the mid.

One person took to social media to say: ‘It took us 3 hours or more to get out the car park as we were just sat in a queue that wasn’t moving!

‘I think this needs to be looked at for next year. Poor lady in front of me was pregnant and nearly wetting herself!’

Every year, some of Britain’s wealthiest families descend on large parts of Cornwall and holiday in their second homes for the summer.

But second-home owners could soon be forced to pay twice the amount of council tax as the Government prepares to hand local authorities more powers to raid holiday homes. 

More than 100,000 holiday homeowners in the UK are set to see their bills rise at the first given chance, including in tourist hotspots in Cornwall, which has already approved the change.

In the past, Cornish residents have sprayed graffiti on second homes, demanding, ‘Rent or sell your empty houses to local people at a fair price’. 

Last month, CCTV cameras were deployed at a beauty spot beach in Polzeath, Cornwall, as part of a crackdown on anti-social behaviour by youngsters at night.

The cameras at Polzeath have an infra-red function to monitor the beach in the dark, when young people have been seen drinking, taking drugs, having sex and littering.

Beach rangers have also raised particular alarm about the behaviour of some public school children and have visited their headteachers to explain the concerns.

Two cameras have now been provided by the council to help beach rangers and police who have two officers patrolling at night. It follows years of concern about the behaviour of youngsters which led to a dispersal order being granted last summer.

The area is a holiday hotspot enjoyed by the likes of David Cameron, who enjoys trips there with his family and has been seen bodyboarding at the beach. The former PM, who left Downing Street in 2016, owns a £2million holiday home in the village of Trebetherick, less than a mile from the beach.

Beach Ranger Andy Stewart, 53, has been patrolling the beach nightly with two local cops and security staff from the Surfside restaurant trying to manage the hoards of public school kids, many as young as 12, who flock there to party. 

And his efforts seem to have worked.

Andy, a retired local police officer who started as a Beach Ranger in 2019, confirmed ‘the problems have eased and there is no more ongoing monitoring or enforcement’.

A 17-year-old boy from Afghanistan who was rescued from a sinking dinghy alongside 38 others in a tragedy which killed at least four told authorities that French fisherman ignored their desperate cries for help.

The teenager, who cannot be named for legal reasons, said those on board the vessel in the English Channel could see the dinghy passengers were drowning but ‘did nothing’.

The boy, whose uncle in Iran had paid people-smugglers 1,500 euros for him to make the illicit crossing from Calais in the early hours of December 14 last year, told police their boat, overcrowded with 46 people, appeared to ‘explode’.

The evidence was heard during the trial of boat pilot Ibrahima Bah, 19, who denies four counts of manslaughter and one count of facilitating a breach of UK immigration law by piloting the ill-fated small boat.

The dinghy had already been taking on water and one passenger was so scared he had performed last rites, Canterbury Crown Court, Kent, heard.

But the teen said the African driver of the home-built craft reassured them they would be saved if they continued into English waters.

In a police video-recorded interview played today in court, he described how the treacherous journey turned to tragedy.

‘Water was pouring into our boat. We knew that we were going to go down and there were French fishermen circling us, looking at us, ignoring us and doing nothing,’ he said, assisted by a Dari interpreter.

‘They could see we were dying and going down and they were doing nothing. We were still in French waters.

‘The African was saying: “It’s not very serious, we can still get to the other (English) boats where they could help us because these ones are looking and letting us die but we can get there”.

‘There was water everywhere and we were screaming, shouting and saying “We are going down”.

‘We kept screaming and asking: “Help, help, help”, but they were coming and looking and saying “No” and just going away.

‘The guy who was controlling the engine was trying to reassure us, saying: “Don’t panic, stay calm, we will do something. These guys are not doing anything but we can get to the other boats and they might help us”.’

The boy said they were ‘some distance’ into the crossing and described being in ‘no-man’s land’ as one Afghani tried to bail out the water.

But he told police he and the 45 others were ‘packed in’ the boat, which then collapsed into itself under the extra weight.

The 17-year-old said how the inflatable ring ‘exploded’ because there were ‘too many’ people on board. 

A total of 39 people were eventually rescued by an English fishing boat, the Arcturus, assisted by HMS Severn, lifeboat crews and the air ambulance.

The boy did not have a life vest and said he could feel himself losing sensation in his body as he held onto a rope in the icy water before being pulled onboard.

Bah, 19, was among those rescued. He faces four charges of manslaughter in relation to the four men who drowned. One has been identified as Hajratullah Ahmadi while the others remain unknown.

The court heard he accepts he drove the boat but denies all five offences.

At the start of his trial, jurors were told Bah allegedly joked to one passenger: ‘I will either take you there or kill you all’.

He later told police he had been assaulted and threatened into taking control of the inflatable in return for free travel by the Kurdish agents in charge of the human trafficking operation.

Those on board had paid thousands to make the trip, one as much as 8,000 euros, the court heard.

But prosecutor Duncan Atkinson said despite being untrained and unlicensed to pilot a boat, by law Bah had a duty of care to his passengers and that his actions amounted to manslaughter by gross negligence.

He said the risks of such a ‘a home-built inflatable made from low quality materials’ being put to sea were ‘present and obvious’.

‘The inflatable carried with it an obvious and serious risk to the life and limb of each of those on board,’ Mr Atkinson told the court.

‘Whilst the defendant, like the others, was a migrant seeking a better life in the UK, he had also, like those others, voluntarily consorted with the agents of organised crime who profited from that quest.

‘More than that, he accepted, in return for a free crossing, responsibility for his fellow passengers.’

The small craft, just 25 to 28ft in length, was neither ‘typically designed nor manufactured’ to undertake a journey in what is the world’s busiest shipping lane, said the prosecutor.

There was insufficient lifejackets, no safety equipment such as flares or a radio, no deckboards and was being navigated without lights and by mobile phone.

It was also carrying more than double its maximum passenger capacity of 20.

The Afghani teenager told police he had been in a Jungle camp in Dunkirk for about six weeks when he made the crossing, the court heard.

He had left his home in Afghanistan about 18 months earlier and reached France via Austria and Switzerland.

But he said he wanted to reach the UK to study and ‘make a better life’.

The crossing in December last year was his second by boat in a month, the first having failed when they got lost after spending 13 hours at sea.

He described how three Kurdish men drove the migrants in vehicles to the beach at about 1am, inflated the boat and then ordered them to carry it to the water.

The court heard they were punched, kicked and beaten for not hurrying up.

One of those beaten was an African, said the teenager.

‘This was human trafficking so you have to follow their instructions because if you don’t follow or fall behind or are slow, they beat you up,’ he explained.

Once the boat was in the water, the migrants scrambled for a position.

‘There wasn’t any space to move. All 46 were packed, squeezed to fit into that,’ added the boy.

He said the Kurds got the engine going and the inflatable set off.

Asked who controlled the engine during the crossing, he told police ‘one of the Africans’ but he never spoke to him personally.

‘Everyone was thinking of themselves. Everyone was praying to make it with our lives,’ said the boy.

He added that the agents had decided who was to drive, something the Afghanis would ‘shy away’ from.

‘They don’t give us any safety instructions on what to do or how to do things. Any instructions would have been given to the driver,’ he said.

The teen also told police it was ‘common knowledge’ that once in British waters migrants would be rescued, regardless of whether they were drowning or not.

Asked if the driver had any assistance from others on the boat he said: ‘They (the Kurds) would have given him which direction to take. There were other Africans there but I didn’t see any working as his deputy or helping him or assisting him.’

Jurors at Canterbury Crown Court were previously told to put any ‘bias, emotion, sympathy and prejudice’ aside while deciding the case. 

That was a rubbish idea! Brit is rescued from underground waste container as crowds watch after getting himself stuck during ‘drunken’ prank with his friends in Malaga

• The tourists had put their friend inside a container at Uncibay Square in Malaga
• Emergency services had to dismantle part of the container to get him out

By Natalia Penza

Published: 05:36 EDT, 9 June 2023 | Updated: 06:52 EDT, 9 June 2023

A US tourist has been rescued from sewers in Thailand‘s Sin City after he fell down an open manhole on the way back to his hotel.

Johnathan Vaimaona, 36, wandered around the underground sewage system for ‘what felt like days’ before finally hearing voices coming from a storm drain.

Residents heard the Hawaiian crying out for help and rescuers hauled him out of the 10ft hole in the resort city of Pattaya, known for its hedonistic nightclub scene.

Shirtless and covered in filth, video shows Vaimaona gulping down a soda and speaking to reporters after he was saved.

‘I was in front of the hotel and then I just came up and I don’t know where I’m at,’ he said.

‘I just fell down a hole, and I didn’t know where I was going. I came up on the other end. I don’t know where I was going.

‘It feels like I was in there for days. I don’t remember what was happening.’

Vaimaona said he was returning to the hotel on the afternoon of May 12 when he fell into the hole.

Unable to climb back up, he screamed for help, but no one was around to hear him.

He roamed the underground sewage system crying for assistance before finally hearing voices coming from a storm drain with light streaming in from above.

Security officer Chalee Boonsri, 26, was the first to hear Vaimaona.

‘I was on my way to a convenience store for a drink when I suddenly heard a foreigner shouting,’ he said.

‘I looked around but didn’t see anyone there. But when I looked at the pavement, I saw a man peeking at me from the drain.’

Rescuers lifted the drain grates and pulled Vaimaona out of the sewer.

The tattooed tourist was visibly shattered and appeared to be shaking as he drank from a bottle of soda. Wearing nothing but a pair of shorts, Vaimaona was covered in sludge from navigating the filthy sewer network.

Rescue workers hosed him down and gave him a drink before police questioned him.

He said he couldn’t remember the name of the hotel where he had checked in with his girlfriend, only describing it as the one ‘with the boats.’

After verifying his entry documents and conducting further investigation, the police said they discovered inconsistencies in Vaimaona’s statements.

They said he was speaking in a confusing manner and claimed to be the ‘head of athletes from Cambodia.’

Cops vowed to do a more thorough investigation into Vaimaona’s fall into the sewer.

Thailand’s current military government has made efforts to clean up Pattaya after it was dubbed the ‘sex capital’ of the world and a modern-day Sodom and Gomorrah.

However, the entrenched sex industry and endemic corruption have proved difficult to tame in the once-sleepy coastal city.

A large number of British ex-pats have also set up bars in the sun-drenched resort, which has become an attractive place for pensioners to retire.