A DRIVER has called for urgent repairs to a village pothole after six cars were damaged in one morning.

Corinne Jaques burst a tyre on her Vauxhall Zafira on the way back from the school run on Monday.

While Mrs Jaques, 37, had stopped further up New Road, Messing, to inspect the damage, a further three cars suffered the same fate.

When she took her car to the local garage to be fixed, she was told of another two cars which had fallen foul of the pothole.

Mrs Jaques, from Little Totham, reported it to Essex County Council, but said a man told her while she was waiting to change the wheel he had reported the same pothole a fortnight earlier.

She said: “The road has been covered in water for some time now and I was driving through very slowly and then I heard a bang. The pothole is completely covered and difficult to see.

“I thought I had done the alloy wheel, which would have been £500 to repair, but fortunately it was just the tyre. It was completely split.

“It is disgusting and people don’t have the money to pay for those kind of repairs.

“I will be claiming for compensation from the county council.

“It is six inches deep and right in the middle of the road.

“The pothole is so big that if a motorbike rider was to hit it doing the 60mph speed limit, they would be thrown off.

“In the dark especially it would be hard to see, and I think there will be a nasty accident.”

An Essex Highways spokesman said: “We are aware of a number of defects on this road and repairs will take place in the next four to six weeks.

“After a further report, an Essex Highways inspector carried out an investigation of the site yesterday and found a defect had deteriorated.

“Emergency temporary repairs were put in to make this defect safe until a full repair can be undertaken.”