Plastic pollution is now choking up historical shipwrecks and desecrating the war graves of servicemen lost at sea, divers have warned.

Specialists from the Marine Archaeology Sea Trust (MAST) are currently carrying out ongoing excavations and recover from the wreck of HMS Invincible, which sank in the English Channel in 1758.

But marine archaeologist Kevin Stratford said the team were forced to pick through piles of rubbish accumulating on the stricken ship, and warned that dozens of wrecks were now littered with refuse, including those still containing the bodies of fallen sailors.

“Shipwrecks in the English Channel have every kind of human waste,” he said. “Until the early 90s you could drop anything you wanted to in the sea and so, over the years, the rubbish just built up.

“Shipwrecks act like a reef, trapping the rubbish and acting as an accumulation point for plastics, cans, clothing, paints, glue, carpets, fishing gear. You name it, it’s down there.

“The majority of shipwrecks don’t have human remains, but in the wrecks of World War One and Two ships bodies ended up sealed inside so you will have rubbish accumulating there too.

“You wouldn’t go to a graveyard and dump rubbish there or Stonehenge but nobody can see the impact underwater.”