A former Royal marine has told how he gave the kiss-of-life to a woman who was found hanging from a fence.

And Jason Clark, 37, spoke of his moment of relief when the woman gasped for breath as he brought her back from the brink of death in Padiham.

She was last night being treated in Burnley General Hospital where she was said to be seriously ill, but in a stable condition.

Police said it was suspected to have been a suicide attempt.

The woman was found at the back of Russell Terrace at 9.30am on Sunday morning by Padiham resident, Susan Livesey, who has been taking her young grandchildren for a walk with her son Daniel.

They screamed for neighbours to come and help.

Neighbour Chris Goodwin was the first person to help out, he lifted the woman up to help relieve the pressure from around her neck while his wife Gail phoned the emergency services.

Mr Clark, from Accrington, had been visiting a friend for the weekend when he heard screams coming from Russell Terrace.

He rushed out down back street to see what was happening and said he saw a woman with a washing line wrapped around her neck and hanging from a wooden fence.

Mr Clark said:" I couldn't believe it when I saw a the woman hanging from the fence.

"It's not something you expect to see on a Sunday morning in Padiham.

"She was being held up by a neighbour who was trying to take the pressure off her neck.

"She had stopped breathing and had foam coming out of her mouth.

"She was bleeding from her ear which made me really worried because I thought she had been hanging too long. I thought she was dead."

At this point, Daniel Livesey ran to get another neighbour, Collin Mulgrew, to get a knife to cut the washing line.

Mr Mulgrew said: "I managed to cut the washing line from the fence to get her down, but it was wrapped so tightly round her neck that she was turning grey so I ran back into my house to get some wire cutters and managed to remove the line.

"I never in a million years expected to see something like this and I never want to have to again."

After she was cut down, Mr Clark noticed the woman was not breathing and used his first aid expertise from his time in the marines to perform mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.

He said: "She wasn't breathing and was getting paler by the minute.

"I gave her three sets of mouth-to-mouth before she eventually gasped for air. I was so relieved.

"I'm still in shock and was shaking most of yesterday.

"It was a great feeling to know I've saved somebody's life but I don't want to have to something like this again any time soon.

"It was very distressing for all the people involved."

The neighbours involved in helping the women said they did not know who she was but some had seen her around the area.

Police Inspector Dave Croll said they were treating the incident as a suspected suicide and that the woman was in a stable condition in Burnley general.