A FAMILY watching late-night television got the shock of their lives when a car ploughed into their hallway.

Mrs Roween Conley and her partner Tony Walkden were lucky to escape unhurt as their Christmas tree was catapulted across the front room and a door was ripped from its hinges at their home on Dumers Lane in Radcliffe.

Moments before the smash at 10.45pm on Tuesday (Dec 9) , their daughter, Melissa, had climbed the stairs at the point where the Peugeot slammed through the gable end of the house.

A shocked Mrs Conley said Melissa, a pupil at Derby High School, would have been struck by the car and flying debris if the accident had happened just a few minutes earlier.

She said: "Melissa had only just gone into the hall and upstairs to bed when the car hit. The Christmas tree and bricks were thrown across the room. My daughter could have been killed or seriously injured.

"Everything seemed to happen in slow motion. The Christmas tree was put up in a spot where Tony normally sits. I am just relieved that none of us were injured."

The male driver and a female back-seat passenger fled the scene, leaving a man trapped in the front passenger seat. He needed hospital treatment and was helping police with their inquiries.

Mrs Conley added: "They were drunk. The driver said that 'everything was okay' but he ran off with a girl when Tony went outside."

It is believed the car was travelling at more than 70 mph when the driver lost control of the vehicle and veered across a grassed area before hitting the house.