Two-year-old hitches a 50mph lift on the back of his mother's car

A two-year-old boy clung to the back of his mother's Land Rover for more than three miles while she drove at speeds of up to 50mph unaware he was on board.

Penny Whitney, of Steeple Bumpstead, Essex, only realised what was happening when another car flagged her down.Without his mother's knowledge, son Blake clambered on to the back of the four-wheel-drive vehicle before she set off. He managed to hold on as she drove along winding country roads.

"I couldn't believe it," said Mrs Whitney. "I just think he must have a guardian angel looking after him. I don't think that I could have held on that long."

Mrs Whitney said that when she lifted Blake from the back of the vehicle he was "absolutely rigid" and fell asleep when placed in the back seat. "I thought of all the things that could have happened," added Mrs Whitney. Thankfully, he was perfectly all right."

She said that Blake was so small she could not see him in her rear-view mirror as she drove from Steeple Bumpstead to nearby Clare, Suffolk.

Mrs Whitney had left home in the Land Rover, believing that she had left her husband, David looking after Blake and his brothers James, six, and eight-month-old Max. But Blake's father thought that he had gone on the trip to Clare. As she drove away from their home in Hempstead Road, Mrs Whitney didn't see Blake jump on board The Land Rover has a foot stand for getting into the back door and railings, so Blake was able to hang on.

Oblivious to the danger her son was in, Mrs Whitney gathered speed along the roads which run through countryside along the Essex-Suffolk border.

She said that she had not had time to find out the names of the three men in a passing car who alerted her. She appealed for the three to come forward so she can thank them.

"I really am very grateful to them," said Mrs Whitney. "They left while I was strapping Blake in. I think I said thank-you to them but I was in such a state I really can't remember."