YOU would be forgiven for thinking you'd stumbled onto a film set in Grimsby town centre ... as a plague of zombies took to the streets.
Victoria Street turned into ghoul central as about 100 zombies stumbled and groaned their way through Saturday afternoon – but it was all a bit of "armless" fun to mark World Zombie Day.
The fake blood-soaked brain-dead enthusiasts put the grim back into Grimsby by parading through Freshney Place shopping centre, causing shoppers to stop in shock and awe.
Head zombie Jamie Hill, who organised the walk, led the chant: "What do we want?", for his followers to reply in unison: "Brains!"
That was followed by: "When do we want them?" and the united chorus was: "Now!"
Jamie, who will soon be one of the extras in rock star Alice Cooper's concert in London, arrived at zombie HQ, better known as The Barge, in a hearse complete with skeleton.
Jamie, giving a quick instruction on how to walk like a zombie, said: "Freshney Place is the obvious venue because zombies love precincts. They are always in the movies."
The eerie entourage, some of whom had spent hours preparing with special make-up effects, passed Grimsby Minster and posed for photographs before heading to a number of town centre pubs.
Jamie explained: "It all started with an invitation on Facebook and friends told friends, and here we are with more than 100 zombies.
"We want to make this an annual event and maybe do it more regularly for charity."
Jamie, an Immingham-based loading shovel operator, said he had drawn inspiration from cult movies such as Dawn Of The Dead, Dead Snow and 28 Days Later.
The event attracted people of all ages and all walks of life.
Garry Croft, who works as a haulier in Immingham, said: "The shock value was amazing. It was great to see the look on the Freshney Place security guards' faces. We are just testing the water with it and hope we can do it more often."
Phil Paterson, 29, a computer scientist at the University Of Hull, disguised himself as a policeman and pretended to gnaw the right arm of his zombie friend Neil Stead, 36, who works for CPL coal products firm, of Immingham.
He used a pig's trotter as his arm to achieve the effect.
He said: "Everyone seems to like my stump. We saw the event advertised on Facebook and thought we would join in."
Bar staff at The Barge, Kate Collins, Zoe Cunningham and Jess Dunlop, were in high spirits and dressed up as ghouls. And regular Jade Johnston, 24, was joined by her mother Jaqui, 58, who declared: "We love zombies!"
They were joined by friends Tim Charlton, 22, Laura Smy, 23, and Mick Waine, 26, who said he used Wayne Rooney as his zombie inspiration.
And four-year-old Mackenzie Tinmurth and his brother Reece, 9, dressed up as ghouls along with Portia Parker, 9, and her brother Daniel, 11.
Reece said it had taken more than two hours to get them dressed up, using old T-shirts and fake blood with the help of their parents.
He said: "It is a bit scary – but a lot of fun."
View a video of the zombie walk on www.thisisgrimsby.co.uk
