by Andy Gray

agray@thekmgroup.co.uk

A Snodland mum says her pet dog saved her and her son after a disability car exploded in a ball of fire on the drive.

Kerry Sutton, who is recovering from a brain tumour, was asleep at her two-bedroom home in Alex Hughes Close when her C3 Citroen Picasso caught alight in the early hours of Sunday.

But Moo, her pet Jack Russell, raised the alarm as flames leapt through the letterbox and threatened to engulf the semi-detached property.

Miss Sutton, 39, said: "Moo started nudging me to wake up and I thought 'what’s going on out there?’

"I looked out and saw the car on fire and flames rising up towards the front of the house.

"I thought, 'how am I going to get out of here?’"

With the house filling rapidly with smoke, Miss Sutton woke her son and carer Connor, 17, and the pair made a dash downstairs towards safety.

A neighbour helped them escape into his garden by smashing a wooden fence which separates the properties.

Miss Sutton, who had a life-saving operation to remove the tumour in June, said: "The car was exploding everywhere and the doors and windows were cracking, it was horrific."

Miss Sutton and her neighbours on both sides were evacuated as two pumps from Larkfield arrived at 3.13am to tackle the blaze.

The car was completely destroyed and the front door and windows of the property and her neighbour’s house were also left charred.

Miss Sutton also lost carpets and personal belongings to smoke damage.

Police and an ambulance team attended but no one was injured.

Following a search by forensic teams, police said they were not treating the incident as suspicious, but believed the fire was as a result of a fault in the car’s front engine.

Miss Sutton said Sunday’s fire was the latest in a long line of horrendous luck to befall her following the death of her father and brother last year.

She said: "I can’t sleep at night because of the trauma – every little noise wakes me up.

"I can’t bear the thought of Christmas, but thanks to Moo at least I’m here to see it."