A GREAT-GRANDMOTHER came within feet of death when a car ploughed into her living room.

Harriet Thwaites, 86, who is better known as Cissie, was asleep when a Vauxhall Cavalier careered off the road and into her bungalow at Westmorland Road, in Redcar.

It was only when panic-stricken neighbours came to rescue her that she realised the "terrible bang" she had heard was an entire front wall tumbling down.

A neighbour's son restrained one of the car's occupants until the police arrived, while two other people in the car were caught later.

Cissie said: "I was asleep in bed when I heard a terrible bang. Then the front door bell rang and when I answered it, the neighbours got me out.

"They showed me that there was a car in my house, and said there might be a gas leak."

The brave grandmother and great-grandmother-of-five, who is now staying with a friend, emerged from the ordeal unscathed.

But a neighbour who witnessed the drama on Wednesday night from her upstairs window said she is still shocked by what happened.

"I was in bed reading a book when I heard screeching tyres," said Victoria Sheward.

"I thought the noise was getting a bit close and pulled back the net just in time to see the car mount the pavement and go right through Cissie's window.

"I've never moved so quickly in all my life - I was just so worried about what might have happened to her."

Despite the devastation to her bungalow, the former caretaker at Redcar's Sacred Heart School, is reticent over the crash. "People are much more important than places, and I couldn't have been better looked after by my neighbours," she said.

l A 20-year-old, from Redcar, has been charged with drink driving, driving without a licence and insurance, and failing to stop at the scene of an accident. He will appear at Teesside magistrates court on Wednesday