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A Vancouver Paralympian is pleading for help after a valuable piece of equipment was stolen from him Tuesday night.

Thirty-one-year-old Donovan Tildesley and his friend parked their car at the parkade on 550 Hornby St. around 6:30 p.m.

When they came back around 7:15 p.m., they realized the car’s side window had been smashed.

None of Tildesley’s friend’s belongings were missing, but his bag stuffed under the front seat was gone.

Inside that bag was an audio player called — Victor Reader Stream — made exclusively for the blind and visually impaired.

“This thing does not have a screen or anything like that, so nobody with sight could use it,” Tildesley said.

Tildesley has been blind since birth. But his condition has never stopped him from achieving success. Tildesley is a three-time Paralympian, who won multiple swimming medals at the Sydney 2000 Paralympics, the 2004 Athens Paralympics and the 2008 Beijing Paralympics. He also had the honour of being Canada’s flag bearer at the 2008 Beijing Paralympics.

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He says the audio player had voice recordings he made while on his recent trips to Alaska and South Africa.

His voice recordings are the only way Tildesley can document his trips.

“It’s like taking a sighted person’s camera away,” Tildesley said. “Recordings for a blind person are of that same ilk, if not more important, because they contain a snapshot of life and history and the things gone by.”

More importantly, however, the audio player also contained a recording Tildesley made of his father’s memorial service. Tildesley’s father passed away last month after an 11-month battle with pancreatic cancer.

Unfortunately, Tildesley didn’t upload the recording to his computer before the player was stolen.

He says the value of the audio device is about $300.

“Anybody who can see will have a real challenge using it,” Tildesley said.

He says he just wants the device back, no questions asked.

Tildesley is offering anyone who turns in the device and the SD card a $1,000 reward.

The device can be mailed or dropped off at the Vancouver Club at 195 W. Hastings.