Vision of my children saved me, says shot Pc

THE policeman shot by fugitive Raoul Moat has told how a vision of his children saved his life.

Pc David Rathband said he knew he was bleeding to death when he was blasted in the face as he sat unarmed in his patrol car last month.

Slumped in the footwell of the Northumbria Police Volvo T5, the father-of-two felt his life slipping away as blood poured from his wounds.

As Moat left him for dead, he was able to call for help using his police radio. It was then that a vision of his son Ashley and daughter Mia filled his mind.

They began to speak and Ashley, 17, reached out to grab hold of his father to stop him slipping away.

Pc Rathband said: "I knew he hadn't hit me in the brain because I knew what was happening. So I just knew that I was going to bleed to death. It's at that point where I think I faced death alone and was quite frightened. I saw my two children and they were floating past me from my left to right as I sat there and they stopped.

"And I can remember my son and daughter speaking to me and I couldn't speak to them, I was drifting away, and as I was drifting away my son stood up and grabbed hold of me.

"And my daughter was standing next to him and then I heard the sounds of the sirens coming and then my son and daughter disappeared in my mind.

"And I heard three sirens coming from the area of where my police station was and that was the point where I knew before the sirens I was facing death because I did not by any imagination expect to live and I didn't want to die in a police car."

He was discharged from hospital two weeks ago but has returned since for further operations to his left eye. Surgeons were unable to save his sight.

Pc Rathband will tell his story on In the Line of Fire on ITV1 at 730pm tonight.