GRIPPING her panic-stricken husband Mark's hand tight, surrounded by two midwives and all the while about 35,000 feet above the ground, Kelly Fisk started giving birth on a plane.
As her emergency jet from a holiday in Spain approached Southend Airport, the mother-of-two from Margaretting started experiencing contractions.
"It sounds so corny but just as I went over the white cliffs of Dover I had contractions. It was quite dramatic," said the 29-year-old personal assistant.
"But my husband, he was petrified, he looked dreadful. He was white as a sheet because I guess it's the prospect of having his wife, and his unborn child, to worry about."
Within hours she gave birth to her daughter safely on the ground in Basildon University Hospital – yet 11 weeks prematurely.
Exactly one year on, Sadie May – aptly named after the month she was born in – is celebrating her first birthday in full health, despite spending months in hospital needing help to breathe.
"She's a fighter," Kelly said. "She is possibly the happiest, most smiley baby you will ever meet and that is what everyone says. She is a bit delayed with her development and it takes her a while to catch up, but she thrives off her older brother Ben.
"And she's a bit of a daddy's girl."
It was last year on April 25 when Kelly and her husband Mark flew from Gatwick to Murcia to stay in her parents' villa in San Juan, Alicante.
At just 26 weeks pregnant, she never dreamed of going into labour.
After experiencing bleeding on the Friday she was admitted to Huércal-Overa hospital, but later sent home. She again experienced bleeding the following Wednesday, was admitted back to hospital where she stayed until Sunday – even being forced to cancel her flight home.
After fighting through the language barrier, her health insurers Bupa organised an emergency flight home via a Lear Jet 35 – a tiny passenger plane compete with two midwives.
On Sunday afternoon she set off. "The nurse said she had a strong feeling I was going to give birth on the plane, but she didn't tell me that, and I didn't feel like that, I was just relieved these people were going to get me home," said Kelly, who lives in Maldon Road.
By 2.55am, she gave birth to Sadie, weighing just 2lbs 10oz, in Basildon University Hospital.
"We are grateful to the nurses at Basildon, we don't know where we would be without them."
Her husband Mark, a 30-year-old director at a fire alarms company, says he was "petrified" on the fateful night. "It was quite daunting," he added
Sadie celebrated her first birthday last week with a picnic.
