Sunbed wars: Costa chaos as tourists fight for a place by the pool

It's day three of the sunbed wars at the Paradise Park Hotel in Spain’s Canary Islands.

At the large tropical lagoon-style swimming pool, a crowd of guests suddenly emerges, rushing to be the first to lay their towels on a sunbed.

It's the start of chaos.

The swarm of tourists sprints the 20 metres from the pool entrance to the sunbeds - and one man takes the lead, managing to put towels on five sunbeds. 

It's game, set and match for the remaining customers who watch in astonishment.

The incident only came to light after a video went viral in mid-July, although the hotel's management declined to comment on what happened when contacted by Euronews.

You might think this is a rare incident at resorts along the Spanish coastline, but it's happening on a daily basis, sometimes menacingly. 

The latest incident took place this week, also in the Canary Islands, when two British tourists kicked a mother out of her sunbed to steal her place, according to Britain's Daily Mail newspaper.

To avoid these clashes, Spanish hotels are getting creative.

At six-thirty in the morning, the line starts forming outside the swimming pool at the Sunset Beach Club Hotel on Spain's famous Costa del Sol.

The venue will not open until nine, but there's already a queue of about thirty people.

"We have customers here who are very proud to be the first in line. We have set up security so that when we open the door, there is no pushing and shoving and no sneaking in," Miguel Marcos, the hotel's director, told Euronews.

"If we didn't have controls, it would be a jungle," he adds.

Organisation is key at this hotel, which has 700 sunbeds to be shared by the 1,800 guests.

At nine o'clock José Carlos, the hotel's sunbed controller, opens the doors and the towel game