A DISTRAUGHT mum has described the horrific scene inside a Fordingbridge home where a family were found dead this morning.

Alayna Brooks, who lives just a few houses away, was the second person to go into the house where a couple and their young daughters were found dead.

Ms Brooks, 53, said she heard screaming from the children's grandmother who was shouting: "My babies are dead".

She then ran across the road to the woman, and went inside the house in Provost Street where she first saw the body of the children's mother in the dining room.

Ms Brooks claims the woman - named locally as Vicky - had been suffocated with a plastic bag and the two girls were found dead in a double bed upstairs in the family home.

She told the Daily Echo that the man - named locally as Andy, who was thought to a delivery driver - was found hanged.

Ms Brooks added; "I was appalled. It was the most appalling thing I have ever lived through.

"The first thing I thought when I saw the woman dead was are the babies alive. I went upstairs. He was hanging. I shook his leg and I said "just wake up, you've got a family" but it was just not happening.

"I was distressed. I saw the little girls side by side in the double bed. They were dead. I think they were suffocated."

Ms Brooks said the house was peaceful inside, with toys scattered about like any typical family home where young children lived.

"It was horrific. They were a beautiful family. I don't know. As neighbours we new each other. I'm appalled, upset and shocked."