Human remains on SA beach

Human remains on SA beach

By Mohamed Allie
BBC, Cape Town, South Africa

A leisurely afternoon walk on a beach in the South African east coast city of East London turned into horror for a woman and her grandchildren when they made a gruesome discovery of some 700 bags containing cremated human remains.

An upset Doreen Meier became suspicious when she saw a large number of plastic bags lying on the white sands of Leeches Beach while walking with her sister and her grandchildren.

It was terrible to find something like this in a public place. I found it heart-wrenching to see even a baby's remains in one of the labelled packages

Grand mother, Doreen Meier

But it was her nine-year old granddaughter's curiosity to open one of the bags which led to the discovery of ashes.

Mrs Meier immediately informed the police of her find.

She said the discovery of the ashes was particularly upsetting for her as all members of her family are cremated when they die.

"It was terrible to find something like this in a public place. I found it heart-wrenching to see even a baby's remains in one of the labelled packages," she said.

Judging by the way the bags were positioned, Mrs Meier said she was convinced the ashes had been dumped on the beach rather than being washed from the sea.

According to police spokesperson Superintendent Eddie Watson a lot of the ash and pieces of bone had been washed away by the sea.

Unclaimed ashes?

He confirmed that police had picked up about 700 packages containing the remains of people who had been cremated.

Mr Watson said it looked like no attempt had been made to bury or hide the ash.

"There were several large heaps of ash and several plastic bags containing ash which had labels with names and codes on them," he said.

Labels on the packages show serial numbers and dates ranging from between 1989 and 2000.

The packages have been sent to Cape Town for analysis to confirm that the remains are in fact human.

A spokesman for an East London crematorium said ashes that were not claimed by relatives of the deceased were sent back to the undertakers who normally keep them for up to five years before disposing of the remains.