A MUM whose dream home fell off a cliff overnight has told of the moment she and her family heard the bungalow crumbling around them and ran for their lives.
Emma Tullett was with her four children and her partner John when the roller blind on the window behind her clattered to the floor – and seconds later, she heard “crackling”.
Within seconds, cracks appeared around the hallway of their five-bedroom coastal bungalow.
And as John looked out of the window, he realised the fence running along the clifftop around 18 feet from their home on the Isle of Sheppey, Kent had disappeared.
Emma told the Daily Mail: “That’s when he said we needed to get out of there – now.”
As the family fled with Jack Russell Lola, they noticed a “chunk of cliff” had disappeared.
“I was absolutely in a blind panic,” Emma said.
“It felt as if it all happened so quickly.”
She said it “sounded like the house was starting to fall apart at the seams”, but added: “At that point, I didn’t think that could really happen.”
“I kept thinking, you can’t just lose a whole house off a cliff,” she said.
“I didn’t know what was going to happen or how much was going to go.”
But over the course of several days, the land beneath the home collapsed entirely and finally entirely gave way – leaving Emma and her family with just the clothes they had on when they fled.
The heartbroken mum-of-five, who bought the property – which was named Cliffhanger – in August 2018, had not got insurance as it was labelled too close to the cliff face.
She said she has “lost everything” and was pictured with her head in her hands as she gazed at the damage.
“It’s heartbreaking. I’ve never cried this much,” she said.
“It’s not something you expect to happen.
“It’s like something from a war zone – something that’s happened in another country, to someone else.
“If your house catches fire, they put it out and it’s done.
“With this, it was bit by bit – like torture.”
Emma, 42, John, 29, their two children, Alexa, seven, and Harry, six, and Emma’s daughter Rebecca, 17, and son Owen, 15, from her previous marriage are living in temporary accommodation in Sittingbourne.
Council workers have brought toothbrushes, while Red Cross volunteers have provided food parcels and friends have given clothes and crockery.
Emma, an assistant manager for the Co-op, says she’s sleeping just two hours a night and can barely eat.
“I must have lost weight – but it’s hard to tell because I’m wearing other people’s clothes,” she said.
She and John knew the house was on an eroding soft-clay cliff when they bought it for cash in August 2018.
They were unable to get a mortgage because of its position, and they didn’t undertake a survey or have buildings insurance.
“People who don’t know the area say, ‘You bought a house on the edge of a cliff and get surprised when it fell off’,” she said.
“But we weren’t on the edge.”
There were warning signs in the hours before, with cracks appearing in brick paving at the front of the house.
But Emma believe there was no need to panic.
Just a short time later, the bungalow began crumbling so quickly her children had to escape without shoes.
Over the following days, they were forced to watch as more and more of the property was lost.
“It was horrible. I cried, my partner cried,” she said.
They borrowed a car to visit their home – and realised the kitchen, hallway and bedroom were hanging above a void.
Emma said: “Everything that mattered to me was in that bedroom – my baby-scan photos, the children’s first curls in my jewellery box, their first teeth.
“I could replace furniture and TVs, but losing mementos was heartbreaking.
“I cried all the way back.”
Emma and John believed they’d have 40 years in the house, which cost £195,000, and say they weren’t “at all” concerned about an imminent landslide and didn’t have a survey done.
“It was stupid, but to be honest I don’t think a survey a couple of years ago would have picked up that we were going to have a massive landslide anyway.”
She also didn’t take out building insurance as it was “way too expensive”.
Shocking pictures show the home having been ripped from the top of the cliff, scattered on the ground below.
Initially, half the property fell to the sea below along with her orange Seat Ibiza and she, her partner and four of her kids were evacuated.
But four days later, the rest of the house finally collapsed, and all that appeared to be left was the annex building and swimming pool.
Parish Councillor Malcolm Newell, who lives two doors away, estimated at least eight households have been told they cannot return, reports the BBC.
He said: “I’m out. I can’t go back. Apparently there are more cracks appearing along the front.
“This should have been dealt with a long time ago. It’s not right to have people’s homes, their livelihoods, falling into the sea.”
Mr Newell believes that rock-filled wire cages should be installed at the bottom of the cliffs to make the area more secure.
He added: “If this was looked at earlier on and more was done, the cliff could have possibly been saved.
“People complain that the money could be put to better use in the community, but we are part of the community – that’s what’s wrong here.
“I don’t want to move, anyone would give a million dollars for that view, this was supposed to be the last stop for me.”
A spokesman from Swale Borough Council said: “We met with local representatives and the Environment Agency to discuss erosion along this stretch of the Island.
“The new council administration have expressed their opposition to the current shoreline management plan approach where there is no active intervention to defend this area, and this position is due to be formalised when we are able to hold a full council meeting.
“In the intervening period, we have continued to engage with the Environment Agency to see what measures can be taken.”
