INVESTIGATIONS were continuing today into a Hampshire railway line drama which nearly claimed the life of a teenager.

An 18-year-old girl was struck by the Totton to Romsey passenger train in the Ramalley area of Chandler's Ford.

The girl was today still at Southampton General Hospital where she was being treated after it is believed losing both legs below the knee in the incident.

British Transport Police, who are investigating the incident, say that it is not being treated as suspicious.

As reported in later editions of yesterday's Daily Echo, the train driver hooted his horn when he suddenly spotted something on the line just before 3pm on Tuesday.

A British Transport Police spokesman described how the shocked train driver did all he could to avoid what could have been a fatal accident.

The spokesman said: "He pulled on his emergency brakes but he was not able to stop in time. He did all he could to avoid her."

Power to the line, which is believed to carry hundreds of volts, was cut and the track was blocked for more than an hour while a rescue operation was launched and a full police investigation swung into action.

Paramedics, doctors and fire crews had to make their way through woodland in the Ramalley area to get to the scene, about a mile north of Chandler's Ford railway station.

The injured girl was given morphine to kill the pain while the medics stabilised her condition.

She was put on a stretcher but the embankment was too steep and slippery.

Eastleigh firefighters rigged up a rope system to winch the stretcher on to the nearby railway bridge. It was then taken away on a trolley.

A Hampshire Fire and Rescue Service spokesman said: "The stretcher had to be kept in a horizontal position after her condition had been stabilised.

"When we got to the scene there was a girl lying on the track and she was surrounded by paramedics and doctors. They had given her morphine because of the pain."