A well-known restaurant has been wrecked in a blaze.
The roof caved in during the fire at the Chalkwell Park Rooms, a popular function suite on the edge of Chalkwell Park, Westcliff.
Firefighters spent several hours fighting the blaze in the early hours of Saturday morning. No one was inside the building.
Police were first on the scene after the fire set off a burglar alarm. They called the fire crews at around 2.15am but they were unable to get into the building until a keyholder arrived.
Leigh firefighter Paul Anderson said: "By this time it was heavily smoke-logged.
"This made it quite hard to locate the fire. The call was a bit late, really, and around half of the roof collapsed."
An investigation is now under way into how the fire started, although the cause is not thought to be suspicious. Early indications suggested the fire may have started in an ashtray or within rubbish left in the restaurant.
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