The local beauty crowned Miss Earth Belfast has revealed how her obsession with tanning left her in agony following a sunbed session that almost caused her permanent skin damage.

Self-confessed tanaholic Caroline Connor spoke out after new figures revealed that almost every day one woman aged between 20 and 29 is diagnosed with skin cancer — and experts blame the binge-tanning craze.

Melanoma cases have soared by a third across the UK in recent years, making skin cancer the most commonly diagnosed cancer among women in their twenties. Doctors fear so-called tanorexia is the main cause.

Just 20 minutes in a sunbed booth is the equivalent to spending a day at the beach, which medical experts say can cause lasting damage.

Caroline Connor (19) says her obsession with getting a tan almost left her with permanent skin damage when a 15 minute sunbed session went horribly wrong.

She wanted to be brown so badly that she risked serious burns from a sunbed.

Caroline said: “I hadn't been in the sun or on a sunbed for six months and when they asked me how long I wanted to lie on it I thought nothing of saying 15 minutes.

“But the sunbed had just been re-tubed and was more intense than I thought it would be.

“My whole body was burnt and after a few hours I was peeling everywhere. I couldn't wear a bra for two weeks.

“I was aching, I was never in as much pain in my life.”

Caroline, who was recently crowned Miss Earth Belfast at the beauty competition that raises awareness for environmental issues, first became aware of |tanning on a family holiday in the USA.

“I was six and I was in Florida with my family,” she says.

“I thought getting a tan was great because I'd been modelling since I was six months old so I always had to stand out.

“I started to realise a tan made me look better.”

Whenever the sun came out Caroline was outside trying to get a glow and would even go as far as using baby oil instead of sun screen.

“I would have started off wearing factor 30 then down to factor eight, after that I'd put on the baby oil,” she said.

“I'm quite dark naturally and in the sun I don't tend to burn so I didn't think it was dangerous”.

Soon Caroline's tanning desire started affecting her work.

“After I got burnt in the sunbed I couldn't go to some of my modelling jobs,” she said. “I was literally slapping myself in moisturiser. I couldn't fly because my skin was so dry and the humidity of the plane would have made it worse. My skin was already badly peeled.”

But it wasn't until the beauty saw how the tanning affected someone she knows that she made a change.

“I know someone who is six years older than me but she looks about 30 years older,” said Caroline.

“She is so tanned, she literally slept on a sunbed every single night. I saw her up close at a function and I nearly had a heart attack.

“I didn't realise it was her. Sunbeds and sun-bathing has aged her and damaged her skin. I realised then it wasn't worth it.”

Caroline decided it was safer to fake it than risk skin damage from the sun but the products she was using left her looking too tanned.

“I noticed the tanning products were making my skin literally flake and the colour was too dark.

“I was trying to get make-up and went into a shop to buy some foundation.

“They said they didn't have anything for my colour, it was so embarrassing. I said to myself, what colour am I?

“Once I was called Oompa Loompa (characters from Roald Dahl’s Charlie and Chocolate Factory books) I knew I needed to change my fake tan.

“That's when I came across He-Shi. The He-Shi products don't dry my skin or give me that orange colour.

“I don't look like I've just come out of Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory anymore”.

As Miss Earth Belfast 2009, Caroline is keen to set a good example for young girls and women in Northern Ireland.

She said: “So many young people see tanned celebrities in the magazines and that's what they want to be like.

“But it's impossible to look like them, that perfect glow is all down to airbrushing.

“I have learned to be who I am and if you think a bit of fake tan will make you feel better, then fair enough.

“But don't burn your skin so when you're 20 you'll look like you're 50.”