MORE than 1,500 tents used by revellers at one of the South's largest music festivals have been given a new lease of life sheltering thousands of vulnerable refugees.

The makeshift shelters are among thousands of items donated from partygoers leaving Bestival on the Isle of Wight.

Now the shipment of emergency gear has been received by aid workers operating a sprawling refugee camp in Calais notoriously known as 'The Jungle'.

They were collected from a series of Donation Compounds set up on the festival site in Robin Hill Country Park for the 50,000 revellers to leave any unwanted camping equipment in aid of the refugee appeal.

Overall more than 1,500 tents, 500 sleeping bags, hundreds of wellies, air beds and mattresses and an array of clothing, jackets and toiletries were collected from the compounds and the wider site.

Most have been received at the Calais camp while some will also be sent to settlement on islands in Greece where migrants are stranded.

It follows a 70-strong festival team tent salvage team battling through torrential rain, mud and high winds to collect them after the festival's climax.

Charity Challenge and Adventure also collected 2,120 chairs which will be cleaned and returned next year for the festival's Rent-a-Chair stall which this year generated £3,675 to be distributed among island charities.

Gary Meek from Challenge and Adventure who coordinates the Salvagers said the extreme weather hampered collections with some of the tents in too poor a state to donate.

He said: "It could have been so much more given the uplift in salvage volunteers but the weather and conditions were unfortunately against us. We live and learn, and we'll be back next time as keen as ever to make the most of the opportunity available to local, national and international charity efforts."

Meanwhile 100 pairs of wellies collected by teams will be sold in Bestival's charity shop in Newport, Isle of Wight, and proceeds also distributed to local charities.

The festival returned had returned for its 12th year running from September 10-13 and was organised by Radio One DJ and Hampshire resident Rob Da Bank.

Headliners were American RnB and hip hop singer Missy Elliot, dance duo The Chemical Brothers and 1980s heart-throbs Duran Duran.

There were also star performances from The Jacksons, House of Pain, Flying Lotus, Annie Mac, Charli XCX, Jurassic 5 and comedy duo the Chuckle Brothers.