10 YRS ON FROM

WHEN Emma Smale broke down in tears on her wedding day it was not just because she was standing beside her adoring husband Kyle.

They were also tears of gratitude to be alive after she miraculously survived the massacre carried out by gunman Derrick Bird 10 years ago this week.

Bird drove around Cumbria with a shotgun and murdered 12 people and injured 11 more before killing himself.

Emma, then 20, stared death in the face when the deranged cabbie pointed his gun at her and pulled the trigger.

It was only thanks to another taxi driver who shielded her from the blast that she lived to tell the tale.

Today she revealed the tragedy forged a bond between her and Kyle Smale, a man she had only been on a handful of dates with at that point.

Emma said: “On the wedding day, I kept thinking about how Kyle might have been with another girl if I hadn’t made it, but he told me, ‘I never could have married anyone else, you are the only one for me’.”

Her happiness that day was in stark contrast to the terror she felt at being caught in the middle of one of Britain’s worst gun massacres.

Emma, then a healthcare assistant, was being driven by cabbie Terry Kennedy from her mum Deborah’s house in Whitehaven to see her GP on the morning of June 2, 2010.

Unknown to either, Bird had already started his deadly rampage by shooting dead his twin brother David and the family’s solicitor – in an alleged dispute over tax bills and his father’s will.

Bird, 52, also believed his fellow cab drivers in the town were cheating him and “winding him up” so decided to murder as many as possible.

Emma said: “I didn’t feel well that morning and had a doctor’s appointment at 10.45am.

“Terry had problems finding my house and was about five minutes late. If he had arrived on time we would have missed Bird and none of this would have happened, but I don’t blame him. He saved me by taking the force of the blast with his hand.”

Emma’s taxi was entering the town centre at around 10.45am when they saw Bird’s Citroen Xsara Picasso approaching, pursued by police cars.

Bird opened fire on their taxi, blowing Terry’s right hand off. Emma was peppered with shrapnel and her clothes with covered in blood.

“I had never seen a gun before that day and I have never been so scared in all my life,” she said.

“I think I was the first to see the shotgun. I was sitting next to Terry in the passenger seat and asked him, ‘Is that...?’ He said ‘yes’ and raised his arm.

“There was a loud bang and his hand exploded. I was covered in blood and bits of human flesh. It was horrific.

“I didn’t even think. I jumped out of the taxi and just ran. You never know if you will stay or run in a situation like that and I just ran.

“Really, I shouldn’t have because Bird had come back for another pop. A police van had blocked him off so he couldn’t turn and was having to reverse.

“I turned around and I remember his expression was one of pure anger.

“I have never believed in angels but I do feel like someone was looking down