A WOMAN has told of the heart-sinking moment she discovered her project had been vandalised by mindless criminals.

Bridie Stanford, 34, had been renovating Dovercourt’s former skating rink, in Lower Marine Parade, alongside her husband, Gary.

The dream is to create a sports and social hub for families and the wider community to enjoy but their efforts were thrown back in their faces after vandals smashed a number of windows at the site.

Mrs Stanford said: “You try so hard to make something nice and then this happens. It’s a real worry. We are investing our life and our money into something which could be targeted again.

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“It highlighted the question ‘Are we doing the right thing?’. When it’s not even open yet and this is happening it certainly makes you question it.”

When she heard of what had happened in the early hours of the morning, Mrs Stanford rushed to the scene and was devastated to see part of her work in tatters.

“I was gutted,” she said, “I was drained anyway because of all the effort we’re putting into it and when I saw the damage my heart just sank.

“I felt sick, it was such a shock. I was really disappointed after all we had been doing, it made me question whether to carry on or not.

“But, I have to say the amount of support we’ve had from the community has been unbelievable. We’ve had volunteers come and help, it makes me realise there are more good people in our community than bad.

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“I really do have to thank everyone who have been so incredibly supportive. It proves we can achieve anything when we all come together.”

The site has been a repeated target for vandals. Former owner Chris Scutt closed it in September last year as it was not financially viable to run and there were “constant break-ins”.

Between 2015 and the date of its closure, the rink was broken into about nine times.

Essex Police confirmed it is investigating the incident which occurred just before 6am on May 10. If you have any information call the police on 101 and quote incident 106.