The first major storm of 2019 is expected to hit the Wadden islands and the north coast this week, online weather bureau Weerplaza has warned.

Force 9 gales, with gusts of up to 90 km/h, and waves of up to 10 metres are forecast for Tuesday. Heavy rain will also sweep across the country while temperatures will dip to between 5C and 7C.

The impending storm will hamper efforts to clean up the debris of 281 shipping containers that went overboard from a cargo vessel last week. Volunteers have been instructed to leave the operation to specialist teams from Monday afternoon and return on Wednesday.

‘The emergency services have their hands full. They don’t want to have to help people who have put themselves in difficulty,’ a spokesman for Friesland’s regional safety council told NOS.

The containers were spilled by the Panamanian-flagged MSC Zoe, one of the world’s biggest cargo vessels, near the German island of Borkum last Wednesday. The Dutch highways and waterways administrator Rijkswaterstaat has held the vessel’s operators responsible and a criminal investigation is under way.

Most of the debris has been removed from the beaches of Ameland, Terschelling and Schiermonnikoog. So far 222 containers have been traced to the seabed but 41 are still missing, prompting fears that more could be washed up during Tuesday’s storm.