A beach-goer has told how he felt "unnerved" by the sea conditions on the day five young friends drowned during a visit to the south coast.

Stephen Deacon said the sea appeared calm on the surface at Camber Sands, near Rye, but below the water, the strong current pushed him in and out.

He told an inquest: "It made me feel uncomfortable. It was pushing me in and out. It was like I couldn't control my own body. The top seemed calm but below it was different."

Mr Deacon was in the water with three children and their dinghy on an extremely busy day at Camber Sands, which can attract up to 30,000 day-trippers during peak season.

On the strong current, he added: "It unnerved me. I just headed back towards the beach as I had three children with me. I wouldn't have gone to the beach if I knew it was like that."

At the inquest in Hastings, Mr Deacon said there were "lots of pockets of shallow and deep holes" and added: "You couldn't tell when these pockets would appear."

Mr Deacon said there were no warning notices about the nature of the sands, and no flag was flying on the day. The only warning he saw was about the possibility of jellyfish, he said.

Later that afternoon, on August 24 last year, Mr Deacon said he saw five Asian men chest-deep in the water apparently playing volleyball before later seeing a Coastguard helicopter.

The inquest has heard that all five men who drowned were fit, healthy and competent swimmers, with some having visited the beach at Camber before without incident.

The five victims were Kenugen Saththiyanathan, 18, known as Ken, and his brother Kobikanthan Saththiyanathan, 22, known as Kobi, both of Normandy Way, Erith, south-east London, and their friends Nitharsan Ravi, 22, of Admaston Road, Plumstead, south-east London, Inthushan Sriskantharasa, 23, of Chadwell Road, Grays, Essex, and Gurushanth Srithavarajah, 27, of Elsa Road, Welling, south-east London.

About a month before the tragedy, two other people also lost their lives at Camber. Mohit Dupar, 36, from Hayes, west London, tried to reach Brazilian Gustavo Silva Da Cruz, 19, as he got into difficulty, but both men died. Their deaths are also being considered as part of the inquest into the five friends' loss of life.

The deaths prompted calls for improved safety at Camber, resulting in Rother District Council agreeing in February to allocate £51,000 in its 2017/18 budget to bring in seasonal lifeguard cover from this summer.

But council officials have said the beach, which is three miles (4.8km) long and nearly half-a-mile (700m) wide at low tide, could never be completely risk-free.

Another witness, surfer Amy Wood, 17, told the inquest how she helped rescue a young man in trouble in the water last August 24, then saw the five young friends further out at sea "waving their arms and bobbing up and down".

Miss Wood, from Kent, said she did not take much notice of the men as she thought they were playing around, and she was concentrating on getting the distressed young man back safely to shore.

Miss Wood, who was visiting the beach with her parents and dog, told the inquest: "It was difficult to work out whether they were playing games or in actual difficulty."

But, thinking something might not be right, she later headed back out to the area where she last saw the five men, but could not see them and later spotted a helicopter hovering overhead.

Lawyer Patrick Roche, representing the five victims' families, praised Miss Wood for her "very brave and commendable" actions and thanked her for going back out to try to find the men.