Man's legs cut off by freight train

A MAN who lay helpless on a railway track for four hours after a train severed both his legs said yesterday his biggest worry was that he would not be able to play football again. Paul Pears, 27, was taking a short cut home after an evening out when he was hit by the train at about 2am on Saturday. He was not found until 6am, when the driver of another train saw him on the track at Chertsey, Surrey.

His mother, Marie, 47, said after visiting him hospital yesterday: 'He was very coherent. He said he knew he had lost one leg as he lay on the track because he saw it on the line. I was amazed at how talkative he was . . . All he was worried about was that he wouldn't be able to play football again.'

Mr Pears, a labourer, regularly played football for a pub team at Chertsey. Last night he was said to be in a stable condition in hospital.

British Transport police, investigating the incident, said Mr Pears was spotted on the track by the driver of a passenger train bound for Weybridge. 'He was fully conscious and reckons he was hit up to four hours earlier by a freight train,' Sgt Alan Hawkett said.

It was thought the traumatic shock of the collision had caused his blood vessels to seal, preventing him from bleeding to death. Doctors were unable to sew his legs back on.