Train traveller Dave Carter is lucky to be alive after leaning out of a window and smashing his head against the wall of a tunnel.

The 38-year-old Gatwick plane worker was badly injured when he popped his head out of a 60mph train to check for his stop.

Unfortunately for Dave, of Fenchurch Road, Maidenbower, Crawley, the train was in Balcombe Tunnel, near Balcombe.

In a split second, Dave was knocked back by the impact on to the floor of the train, bleeding badly from severe gashes in the head, and fell unconscious.

Dave was found by a guard and taken off the train at Haywards Heath, where his wounds were stitched at the Princess Royal Hospital.

But in bizarre twist he accidentally knocked a button on his mobile phone as he was being treated by paramedics and got through to his wife Laura.

Laura said: "I had been trying to ring him. I could hear people talking about him and discussing his condition, saying he had lost a lot of blood and had severe injuries. It was horrendous. I was shouting down the phone but they could not hear me."

Eventually a relative contacted Three Bridges station, where Dave had been due to meet Laura, and he was traced.

Laura arrived at the Princess Royal just after Dave was admitted to the intensive care unit.

The accident happened as Dave caught the 11.32 pm London to Brighton train after going to a concert in the capital.

Dave is now recovering at home with Laura and their two children aged three and one.

Dave said: "I fell asleep and thought I had missed my station. I must have looked outside and hit my head on the wall.

"The first thing I remember is waking up in hospital and seeing lots of pipes, nurses, and doctors."

Laura said: "He was very badly hurt. He is OK but gets tired and it will be a few weeks yet before he gets back to work.

"He can't remember anything of what happened and there were no witnesses because he was sitting on his own. It was a bit of a miracle he survived."

All trains carry warnings that people should not endanger their lives by leaning out.

Laura said she would advise anyone to heed the warnings and added: "I think he woke up and thought Oh God, where am I? and looked out of the window. If you miss your station on that train it goes on to Brighton and there is not another train back until the morning."

Rail operator Connex South Central said there were warning notices along the train warning passengers not to lean out of windows.