A WOMAN has been hailed a lifesaver for the way she dealt with a badly injured biker who was begging for help.

Birgit Bryant, 67, was sitting on the seawall at Eastern Esplanade, Southend, when Lee Bryant’s (no relation) blue MBK motorbike collided with a black Toyota Yaris.

Her proud husband Malcolm, 73, is convinced she saved the life of the 25-year-old, who was left with an horrific open leg wound and blood pouring from an artery.

Mr Bryant recalled: “We had been for a walk and were sitting on the seawall about 30 yards away from where it happened.

“We heard an almighty bang and turned round to see a motorcylist’s helmet flying through the air.

“I felt sickened by it and just froze rigid, but Birgit leapt off the wall and ran over. It was automatic for her.”

Mrs Bryant, a retired pathologist at Southend Hospital, said Lee was in a bad way and pleading for help.

The grandmother-of-four said: “His legwas bad. The thigh bone was broken in half and sticking out at a 45-degree angle.

“I could see the artery throbbing and blood was pouring from it.

“There was no other choice but to put a tourniquet on.

“There were a few bystanders and a man quickly took off his belt.

“I put the belt around and a man held it tight. He wasn’t screaming at all. He said: ‘Please help me, I’m bleeding to death’.

“I told him: ‘No you’re not, just lie back’.

“A woman was talking to him to keep him awake, but he lost consciousness.”

Mr Bryant said he remained on the seawall while his wife helped the biker until an ambulance arrived.

He said: “I’m no good with things like that. I was trembling.

“If you need someone to be there, she’s the one.

“Birgit is extremely level-headed and calm.

“She has made nothing of it at all, but without her I dread to think of the consequences.”

The injured biker, who works as a crane operator at Shoebury-based Industrial Metal Services, was flown to the Royal London Hospital by air ambulance on Sunday evening. He has since woken from a coma, but remains in hospital.

Mrs Bryant, of Woodgrange Drive, Southend, said: “I wasn’t affected by all the blood as I spent 25 years working with blood in pathology. It doesn’t faze me.

“Once the blood stopped pumping out, I wasn’t quite so worried.”