How crabby! Irish town ‘shell-shocked’ after thousands of live crustaceans spill from overturned truck

Irishman Odham McLaughlin had to claw himself out of a real mess after one of his transport trucks — chock full of live crabs — overturned on the highway.

“I was shell-shocked,” McLaughlin cracked later on the CBC radio show “As It Happens.”

The crusty story began when McLaughlin — owner of McLaughlin’s Car Dismantlers and Recovery — got a call on Jan. 12, that one of his trucks had flipped on a highway in County Donegal, reported CBC radio.

At first he wasn’t overly concerned. It was just another day in the transport biz.

But all that changed when he learned the vehicle was carrying 15,000 live sea creatures that were desperately trying to make a break to the Atlantic, a mere 160 feet from where they fell.

According to the Donegal Daily, the truck was bound for Portugal eateries with $97,000 worth of brown crab caught by Irish fishermen, when it careened off the road.

The driver was unharmed, but the aluminum container full of crabs burst open, and they took the opportunity to make a brave bid for home.

“Like they were trying to get back to where they come out of,” McLaughlin said.

Donegal County Council immediately closed the road to allow for a massive recovery operation, reported the Donegal Daily.

After rushing to the scene, McLaughlin said they were “skittering all over.” And since he wasn’t about to catch the scampering shellfish all by himself, he headed to the nearby villages of Burnfoot, Greencastle and Moville, where he enlisted the help of an army of volunteers.

It took 80 men, women and children about 18 hours to pluck rowdy runaways from the field in the dead of night, gather them into sandbags, then lift them with a crane back into their container. A few were killed in the crash — while some made it to freedom.

“Everybody from the village came in to help,” said McLaughlin. “I don’t think it’ll ever be forgotten.”

The driver of the truck was not injured following the single vehicle accident, and the volunteers retrieved about 95 percent of the seafood-to-be.

Happy ending, right? No such luck.

Shortly after the rescue operation, McLaughlin was told the whole lot had to be disposed of as they were not fit for human consumption after their misadventure.

Now he’s crabby.