British mom outruns out-of-control truck heading toward her home, saves daughter

A single mother in England and her young daughter are lucky to be alive.

Thanks to some quick thinking, Jen Whitelam, 23, and Bella, 23 months, escaped the destructive path of an out-of-control 60-foot transport truck heading toward their Derbyshire, England, home.

Whitelam opened her front door to see a 32-tonne driverless truck heading toward her and little Bella. Whiteham grabbed her daughter's hand and sprinted to the back of their semi-detached home as the truck smashed into it.

"I was literally seconds away. If I hadn't opened the front door I wouldn't have seen it," Whitelam told the Sun.

"To open the door and see it coming towards us was terrifying. Bella stood next to me holding my hand. I didn't have time to pick her up, I just dragged her to the back of the house."

Whitelam continued, "As we started to run to the back, the sound of it coming through the wall was like nothing I have ever heard before. The house was shaking and it was awful. The first thing it hit was my car, it totally smashed it. And then it came through the kitchen. We had been eating breakfast in there a few minutes before."

The truck missed the mother-daughter duo by mere inches.

"It's a good job my car was out there, I think that slowed it down a bit, otherwise it might have come through to the room we were hiding in," the single mom told the Daily Mail.

Whitelam's sister, Rebekah, 20, also managed to escape the truck at the back of the house.

Police believe the avoidable crash was the result of the driver leaving the handbrake off.

The collision all but destroyed Whitelam's home and crushed her Ford Focus in the driveway. The truck's firm, JB Tool and Plant Hire, is covering the £69,000 ($109,000 CAD) in repairs needed to make Whitelam's rental home liveable again, a renovation job that will take until at least Christmas. So far, the company has refused to pay for damage to her car and belongings, claiming it's an insurance matter.