A COACH firm was blasted today after a day trip to a theme park turned into a rollercoaster nightmare ride for a party of mums and toddlers.

The tots, who were as young as three-months-old, were stranded inside the 50-seat vehicle for more than 90 minutes after it broke down on the hard shoulder of the M62 .

The members of the Lower Darwen Mother and Toddlers Group were just 10 minutes away from Gulliver's World in Warrington when the coach ground to a halt.

The driver telephoned his boss at East Lancashire Motor Services, Oswaldtwistle, who said he would send somebody to repair the coach.

But the angry mums intervened and alerted local police who came to their aid. Officers managed to get the coach going at two miles per hour up the slip road before it came to rest near a roundabout. A mechanic from the coach company arrived later and the party returned to Blackburn without getting to its destination. One mum Michelle Smith, of Swan Farm Close, Lower Darwen, said: "We were sitting ducks on the hard shoulder and it was just not good enough to be told to wait all that time.

"We could not leave the coach because it was too dangerous. The toilet on the coach was locked and the toddlers were crying and upset."

John Haydock, boss of East Lancashire Motor Services, said: "I am sorry the day out was spoiled, but I don't think there was anything else we could have done.

"We did not have a spare coach to send out so I sent out a mechanic immediately."

They did not specifically ask for a toilet on the coach so it was kept locked.

"What other contingency plan could we have had? These things happen. This is the busiest time of the year and other firms would not have had a spare coach to send out. It was not my decision not to proceed to the destination."

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