Police and neighbours help to deliver baby as Telford mother goes into labour on street

Passing police officers went to the aid of Aisha Adamu when her labour progressed too quickly and her daughter was born on the pavement in Pool Meadow, Hadley, Telford, yesterday afternoon.

As the officers helped husband Abdul Nasser Adamu, neighbours came out of their homes with towels and to help look after the couple's three other children.

Mr Adamu said he was so grateful to everyone who helped his wife and daughter. He said that both mother and baby were none the worse for the drama.

Mrs Adamu, who was celebrating her 35th birthday, started having contractions yesterday lunchtime and the couple went to the Princess Royal Hospital.

"They told us that my wife was only four centimetres dilated and that we could either stay, where we might have a long wait, or go home and risk having to turn around and go back to hospital," said Mr Adamu.

"We went home to get some food for the other children, but it was not long before my wife started to say that the baby was coming. The hospital told us to come in straight away but I don't have a car so I had to call for a taxi.

"Aisha went to the door to wait for the taxi and suddenly she cried that the baby was coming."

The panicked father-to-be, who works for delivery company DHL, went to her side and said he could see the baby's head. I had to hold the head to stop the baby falling.

"Then I saw two police officers walking down the road. I shouted to them, could they come and help me, that my wife was having a baby," he said.

Officers from Wellington police station quickly realised the birth had begun, called for an ambulance, and made Mrs Adamu as comfortable as they could on the pavement outside her home.

With her older daughters, four-year-old Saada and 17-month-old Nabila by her side and worried seven-year-old son Adel in the house, Mrs Adamu gave birth to the little girl at 4.20pm.

"We had to wait for the ambulance to arrive before the cord could be cut so I found a jacket in the house and wrapped the baby in it," Mr Adamu said.

"Neighbours, some I had not met before, came out with towels and one women helped to look after Nabila.

"When the ambulances came my wife was taken in one and the baby in another to the hospital. The police officers were very good, they said 'leave us to sort everything out' you go with your baby.

"By the grace of God they are well, everything is perfect."

The officers tweeted about their unusual shift thanking neighbours for their help.

"Never expected we would be delivering a baby today," they wrote.

The family only arrived in Telford at the beginning of August having travelled from their home in Ghana to Spain, where they lived for several years, and then briefly in Norway where Nabila was born.