Thousands of tonnes of chalk from the famous White Cliffs of Dover have crashed into the English Channel.



The rockfall took place in the Crab Bay area causing the cliff section to crash into the sea below.



No one was injured by the dramatic event which is believed to have been caused by last weekend’s freezing conditions which weakened the cliffs.









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[Related story: Dramatic footage of cliff collapse emerges]











The area will now undergo a full survey to see the extent of last Friday's collapse.

“It appears that it crumbled from the top at high water so there was no-one down below at the time. It was quite a substantial fall," Dover Coastguard told the BBC.









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“Over the years and around the country, including along the coast at Beachy Head in East Sussex, cliffs can fall after water expands when there has been freezing conditions.”



In October, a cliff collapse - thought to have been Britain’s largest for more than a decade - was caught on film in Cornwall.











