A HEROIC couple risked their own lives to rescue an injured driver and a terrified woman who had been hit by flying bricks after a car crashed into a living room.

Electrician Teifion Whitham ignored falling bricks, smoke and the smell of petrol to fight his way into the house in Hemingfield where he found a woman stunned after a Vauxhall Corsa came careering into her front room.

After rescuing the householder, who was bruised and battered by flying brickwork, he turned his attention to the unconscious and bleeding man trapped inside the car, which was still embedded in the demolished wall.

His wife Zoe - a nurse - immediately began administering first aid.

“It was definitely the most dramatic experience I’ve ever had,” said Teifion. “It was a very scary experience. But at the time I wouldn’t say it was frightening. I’ve never experienced anything like it before, but with the adrenaline and everything, it just came naturally to get in there and try and save whoever we could.”

The crash occurred on Friday night in Hart Hills, Hemingfield. Teifion and Zoe, both 39, had been out for a meal and were on their way home through Jump towards their home in Lady Croft Lane, Hemingfield at about 10.30pm when they came across the scene.

“As I came through Jump I could see what I now know to be a cloud of dust, but at first I thought it was smoke. I slammed the brakes on and realised we were the first on the scene at something very serious.

“There was already one neighbour outside as I ran over to the house. I could see inside through the hole, and I could just see this lady panicking. She was obviously in shock.

“I climbed over the car and over the bricks and just grabbed her and said ‘come on, we need to get you out’. There were bricks falling, because it had taken the lintel out above where the window had been.

“I put her over my shoulder and got her outside over the bricks and through the gap at the side of the car, and out to this other neighbour.

“There were still bricks falling, so I turned my attention to the driver inside the car. I thought it was going to catch fire.

“I could smell petrol, and I could see something glistening under the car, which I later found out was an electric heater, I didn’t know at the time and I genuinely thought it was about to catch fire or even explode.

“We had to move some bricks aside and managed to rip the door open. We had to bend it to get in to him.

“My wife’s a nurse, so she got straight in there, checking his pulse right away. He was bleeding from his head and he was unconscious.

“By this time the first responder turned up, and he said he wasn’t happy working there because of the bricks falling, he didn’t feel safe working on the guy, so we decided we just had to get him out. We got him out onto the drive and the first responder and Zoe carried on working on him.”

Once the two casualties were safely out of the house, Teifion then bravely returned inside to turn off the electricity as he had seen cables had been severed and ripped out of the wall. He could still smell petrol and was concerned about fire.

He also set about searching for the woman’s cat.

“This might seem silly to say now, but I am an animal lover, and it was all the lady could talk about. She wasn’t worried about the damage to her house, just her cat.

“I went upstairs and into the bedroom above the living room. I could actually see the floor moving and sagging.

“Thankfully we managed to find the cat, and I found a cat box to get it in.

“The police and fire brigade came, and they did thank us for what we did. It was just so lucky nobody was killed.

“It wasn’t until later when we got home we were talking about it, and Zoe said to me, ‘I was so scared that car was going to explode’.

“You don’t really think about it at the time, adrenaline just takes over.”

Teifion said he would like to know what happened to the woman and the driver of the car.

A police spokesman was unable to provide any details about the recovery of either.