Skelmorlie: This Morning presenter's terrifying clown encounter

Isla Traquair, who visited the village for ITV's This Morning, shows the terrifying moment to her 6,500 Instagram followers when she first encounters the world famous Pennywise clown which has been getting coverage as far as New Zealand, India, and even in the New York Post.

And yesterday ITV prime time show This Morning covered the clown and his zany Facebook videos and games which have gripped the village over the past two years - as he gave his first on screen interview.

Isla, who told viewers yesterday that she'd had an aversion to clowns ever since first seeing the It, movie inspired by the Stephen King novel, is shown in her car, as she gives her genuine reaction to first encountering the clown at night.

The Scottish presenter is heard saying: "I've just caught sight of the clown and can't look." 

She's then seen screaming out "No!" and laughing nervously, saying: "I am genuinely scared; I don't know I can do this."

You can see the clown's features moving around the back window of the car.

You can hear people outside the car, presumably the production crew, saying "In you go" and suddenly the clown's gruesome creatures appear in the car side window looking at Isla, and she says: "Oh my goodness, I don't like it!"

Isla then points the camera at her sleeping dog in the passenger seat and says 'Boo is fine and asleep!'

Thrilling moment captured on Instagram (Image: Isla Traquair)

The feature on This Morning sparked coverage in a number of newspapers, some of which criticized the show for showing the clown on prime time TV and saying it was 'too scary'.

However, the clown's appearance got generally a good reaction from our readers, who see it as harmless fun and actively look forward to the jokes and puzzles that the clown creates for the community to solve.

Upon posting the video, Isla said: "This was not a joke. This was my genuine reaction to seeing the clown. I still don’t know their identity and I’ll keep it that way! Brilliant sport taking part for This Morning."

On air yesterday, enthusiastic locals also gave the thumbs up for the clown who even won over the support of presenters Alison Hammond and Dermot O'Leary following the broadcast of the visit to Skelmorlie.

Alison praised the local scenery said: "It has put the village on the map. I didn't like the idea at first but I now think it is a great idea."

And Dermot added: "I like it - a little general disruption and obviously the village isn't too big and helping put Skelmorlie on the map.

"The village isn't too big so they must know who it is."

Full story: Skelmorlie Clown wins support on ITV's This Morning show | Largs and Millport Weekly News (largsandmillportnews.com)