A Lightning Ridge local worries about damages to the community's reputation after a visitor to the town received a less than ideal welcome last week.

On the morning of Tuesday 15 March, a vehicle was stolen from the Opal Caravan Park and, after being parked in front of a residence on Opal Street, was set ablaze at about 3.45am.

A resident of Lightning Ridge, who witnessed the incident but wished to remain anonymous said local firefighters were able to extinguish the blaze quickly, however they understood the victim of the incident had already been through a difficult ordeal.

"The firies were there very fast - the flames went straight up so it didn't spread beyond the car," they said.

"I believe the vehicle belonged to some poor beggar who had come out here from the floods in Lismore to start from scratch - I think he was going to do a bit of mining and help out a bit."

The resident said there had been another incident involving a stolen car a couple of nights before the Tuesday incident, however the owner of this vehicle had managed to chase the thieves down and retrieve it.

However, they said it was disappointing to hear about these sorts of criminal incidents occurring in the first place.

"It makes you feel very sad actually because we've normally got a lovely community - everybody looks after everybody else and we really appreciate our tourist season which goes from March to October.

"But when you have this sort of thing happen, you get really worried about whether it’s going to turn people off which would be a shame for everyone, including the visitors because they miss out."

Through further investigation, local police were able to recover a trailer which was connected to the now-torched vehicle.

Investigations are currently ongoing in relation to the matter, however, in the meantime, police urge residents and visitors to make sure their vehicles are locked and secured when unattended.