A TEALIGHT candle started a blaze in a caravan that left a trail of destruction costing tens of thousands of pounds.

The blaze spread to a hedge, another caravan, a shed, a 4x4, and melted the side of two houses.

Twenty firefighters and two senior officials went to the fire, on Hightown Road, Ringwood, on Saturday at 5.25pm.

Crews from Ringwood, Fordingbridge and Burley wore breathing apparatus and used three jets and two hose reels to put out the blaze.

Mum-of-four Clare Melbourne, 33, was leaving a football match when she got a call from her daughter Michaela, 12, to say there was a fire.

Clare said: "I was watching the Southampton Leeds match. It was my sister's 30th and my birthday two weeks ago.

"My daughter Michaela phoned me up and said everything's on fire'."

Clare said her daughter Ashleigh, 11, had been playing with a tealight and thought it had gone out but she looked out of the house window and saw the caravan was on fire.

Her sister Michaela, 12, called the fire brigade and a neighbour turned up to help extinguish what he thought was a bonfire, but realised the fire was bigger than he could handle.

Clare added: "There was a gas canister in my caravan and two in my next door neighbour's. As the firemen walked up here the gas canister exploded."

Clare said her babysitter, a 15-year-old neighbour, ushered Michaela, 12, Ashleigh, 11, Conner, 9, and Kayleigh, 2, to safety.

Firefighters rescued Shandy, a two-year-old Staffordshire bull terrier, from the Melbourne's house.

They asked neighbours David and Dorothy Poole to leave their home as the fire spread.

Mr Poole, 79, said: "We couldn't see the flames for the thick billowing smoke."

Mrs Poole, 77, sat in the garden while her husband broke the news to their daughter Angela Glock, 43, the caravan's owner.

Angela, a telesales operator, said she was shocked but glad everyone was unhurt.

Both Angela and Clare said the experience has put them off having another caravan. Clare's caravan was uninsured and was bought for her by her mum just six months ago.

A Hampshire Fire and Rescue Service spokeswoman urged people not to allow children to play with candles or lighting materials.

"Gas canisters do generate a lot of risk. We would ask people to keep them locked away unless they are being used."