A van containing laser tag and paintball guns has been stolen after a woman was shoved from the vehicle as she desperately tried to stop the thief.
Tracy Andrew, who works for Paintball Experience Ltd which has sites in Brighouse and Wakefield, had driven out of the base in Haigh Lane near the Yorkshire Sculpture Park and briefly left the vehicle to close a gate.
A man then leapt into the van and Tracy raced back but was shoved from the vehicle as she fought to stop the thief. She was unhurt but was left badly shaken.
Steve Bull, the owner of Paintball Experience, said about £50,000 of equipment was taken.
The van contained about 80 inferno marker paintball guns plus all the kit that would be needed for 80 customers. About 24 Adventure Sports laser tag guns were also taken, along with Tracy’s iPhone and Kindle, and other equipment.
He said the paintball guns are useless without the gas bottles needed to allow them to fire, and the laser tag guns have harmless infra red beams with a range of up to 400 metres.
“I think it was an opportunistic theft, and they won’t have had any idea what was in the van,” he said. “They were probably expecting it to be full of tools.
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“It’s always a concern when any sort of guns are taken, but they do not look like real guns.
“The paintball ones are in a variety of colours and we stay away from black ones as we want to get away from the image of real guns.”
He said the thieves may try to sell them on an auction site and is urging anyone with suspicions to contact police.
The van is a blue Peugeot boxer long wheel base, registration MM64 EUX.
Mr Bull said two ‘young lads’ were involved in the theft, and Tracy thinks they had an accomplice in a black estate car.
The incident happened at about 3.45pm on Thursday.
