A terrified mother has revealed she will ‘never mentally recover’ after she watched her 18-month-old toddler fell five feet down a sewage drain in horror.
Amy Blyth, 23, was strolling with her son, Theo Prior, when he disappeared through a drain cover as it flipped over and then closed on top of him on Sunday afternoon.
The footage, captured on CCTV from a neighbouring house, showed the moment the quick-thinking personal trainer jumped into the drain to rescue the tot and quickly plucked him from a river of human waste in Tenterden, Kent.
The mother-of-one stood on ledges at the side of the sewer to reach down to her toddler son who had fallen to the very bottom.
Luckily, she was able to grab hold of him and lift him out – but his clothes were left covered in human waste.
Describing the ‘horror film’ moment, Ms Blyth said: ‘My first thought was “Oh my God, he’s dead.”’
The incident happened on a public pavement and Southern Water have since apologised to the family and said they are ‘taking the matter very seriously’.
She added: ‘I yanked the drain lid out, and I just saw him down there, screaming my name. There was sewage up to his knees.
‘I jumped down the drain, but it’s not big enough for me to bend over to grab him. I had to sort of arch my body to grab him and pull him up.
‘I don’t know how I did it. My body went in ways I’ve never bent before, just to get him out of that drain.
‘It was so deep you couldn’t see my head from the ground, and I wasn’t even on the floor.
‘Just as I pulled him up I think someone flushed a chain because we were soaked – with I think, possibly, wee. Our clothes are absolutely disgusting.’
