Vandals who covered three ambulances with graffiti tags after breaking into a Dundee yard caused “a struggle” for patients.
Police are looking for the culprits who sprayed purple paint over patient transport vehicles at the depot in West School Road.
The incident meant ambulances were out of action as staff at the Scottish Ambulance Service scrambled to fulfil patients’ appointments.
Stuart Payne, area service manager, said: “We came into work and found three of our patient transport vehicles had been covered in graffiti. Someone had tagged them with purple paint.
“It must have happened between 8pm on Wednesday and 8am on Thursday. Two of them are now off the road, so we have had a bit of a struggle trying to find vehicles from elsewhere.
“These vehicles are used for taking patients to hospital appointments that they have sometimes waited months for.”
The specialised vehicles are used to transport outpatients attending dialysis and cancer treatment appointments, such as radio and chemotherapy.
Mr Payne said the cost of repairing the damage would come out of the emergency service’s budget.
“I think it’s despicable people can break in and spray paint all over our vehicles, knowing what they are used for,” he stated.
“We had an incident like this a couple of months ago when someone broke into our neonatal ambulance and stole a satellite navigation unit, which put that off the road too.
“We will have to find the money to pay for the damage and find replacements while they are off-road. It’s hard to predict what will happened but we now don’t have cover if we have a breakdown.
“It’s important to stress no appointments were cancelled today down to the efforts of all the staff. But there is the potential that people could miss their appointments.
“The police are involved. They have said they are going to increase patrols around the area.”
A police spokesman said: “Police and community wardens have been advised to give the area attention.”