The emergency services were yesterday (Tuesday) getting back to normal in the wake of the Easter weekend.

With two bank holidays at Easter, Essex Police, Essex Fire and Rescue and the Ambulance Service were geared up to deal with anything that came their way.

But while Essex Fire and Rescue Service has been very busy, both the police force and the ambulance service received fewer calls than they might have expected.

On Easter Day the ambulance service received just 435 calls - compared with a high of more than 600 calls during the Christmas period.

The busiest day during the holiday weekend was Saturday, when 502 calls were logged. The service received 455 calls on Good Friday.

Essex Police had a similar experience. While the service was generally busy dealing with routine calls, there were no major incidents.

From 6pm on Good Friday until 12 noon yesterday (Monday) police received 2,495 emergency calls compared with 2,481 for the same period last year.

Although no figures were available, a spokeswoman for the fire service said the service had encountered very busy periods.

She said: "We have been quite busy this weekend. Both Friday and Saturday were very busy and we had a lot of calls. We were also fairly busy on Monday morning. A lot of those calls were fairly general and there hasn't been anything particularly major."

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