“I found a couple of suitcases too, around the same time, full of things,” he said, almost in passing.



“I burnt them,” he said, pointing to the pile of ashes lying on the boulders. “That’s my job. I collect rubbish, and burn it. I could have found many things that belonged to the plane, and burnt them, without realising.”



His story is backed up by that of another local woman, named only as Isabelle, who spotted the same object while walking on the beach in May, accompanied by her 10-year-old son.



"It was the beginning of the holidays - around May 10," she told local news website Zinfos974.com. "I was walking with my son, Krishna. Then from a rock on which we were standing, he saw an object and shouted: 'Mum, that looks like the wing of a plane!'"



Krishna then jumped on what looked like a suitcase. He managed to prise it open, and then spotted another suitcase buried in the black sand. But the waves were gathering height and so Isabelle ordered her son off the beach.