IT’S not every day that police officers are called out to reports of a zombie invasion in Penketh.

But there’s no need to panic as an investigation into a zombie apocalypse quickly reached a dead end.

Instead, one make-up artist’s skills proved too realistic for some unsuspecting residents, who first raised the alarm bell after setting eyes on what they believed to be a member of the walking dead fraternity.

“I couldn’t believe it when the officers approached me and told me what had happened. It’s quite flattering to think it looked that real,” said aspiring make-up artist and mum of two Chantelle Delaney.

The 23-year-old from Penketh, who completed a course in media and make-up in May, is currently in the process of creating a make-up portfolio in the hope of setting up her own business.

Her brother, 17-year-old Jonathon Lockett, agreed to a zombie make-over so that Chantelle could showcase her stage make-up skills and the siblings headed over to Penketh Social Club on July 25 to take some photographs of her work.

“We got a couple of strange looks from people as we were walking over but I never thought that people would think that it was real,” said the former St Gregory’s High School pupil.

“It’s all boarded up at the back of the club so we went there and I just asked my brother to walk around to get some action shots.

“Then all of a sudden these two police officers started to walk towards us and I was worried I was going to get in trouble because it’s private land.”

But officers soon realised that there was mortal this than meets the eye and they explained what had happened.

“About five minutes later two men and two kids came round the corner. They said they hadn’t seen me but had just seen my brother walking around like a zombie.

“The kids only looked about eight and they were too scared to look at him,” laughed Chantelle.

Sgt Mark Naylor was on duty when he was called to investigate reports of a man covered in blood in Penketh.

He said: “On our arrival, it was clear that there was indeed a male wearing torn clothing, who was covered in blood and appeared to have a severe facial injury and who was stood with a female.

“Unfortunately for them, some houses overlooked the building and the occupants had phoned the police. The make-up was extremely effective and would not have looked out of place on The Walking Dead.”