A MARRIAGE suffered a break down less than an hour after the ceremony - when the bridesmaids' car overheated at traffic lights.

Sisters Carina and Alicia Donnelly, aged 24 and 15, were stranded in Darwen town centre for an hour after the 1959 Jaguar they were travelling in came to a spluttering halt.

The Jaguar - owned by family friend Steve Crosland - had to be abandoned and alternative methods of transport to the wedding reception were sought.

The bridesmaids' 92-year-old grandmother Eileen was able to hitch a left to the reception at Astley Bank with one of the few guests who was behind the wedding party.

But the sisters, from Kirkham, had to wait at the roadside for their father and another guest to leave the party and pick them up in a Renault Espace.

Bride and groom Jemma and Chris Brooks, of Knutsford, breathed a huge sigh of relief when they finally arrived and the wedding photographs could then be taken.

Father of the bride Neil Donnelly, of Kirkham, said: "Jemma wanted to get married at Astley Bank because she thought it would be the perfect location for her big day.

"But it was quite a long drive from the ceremony at St Anne's Church in Singleton over to Darwen and the car was very old.

"The girls were coming through the town centre and the car was going slowly because of road works, then it just gave up and died.

"They were standing on the pavement while everyone else was standing on the lawn drinking champagne."

Mr Donnelly, 60, added: "The vicar's phone had gone off twice during the ceremony, so I certainly had enough extra material to add into my father of the bride speech!"

27-year-old Jemma, a marketing assistant, and 30-year-old Chris, who works in computer software, faced no further transport problems and jetted off on honeymoon to Bali.

Mr Donnelly said: "It was a perfect day, even with the slight technical hitch."