Bird pulled up beside her and pointed a gun at her. She said: “I held my ears and ducked down to protect myself and the gunshot was fired. I felt it go past my ponytail on the back of my hair.”

SHOOT: Now would you call that conscious decision to duck the bullet a miracle, God's hand, or would you say that people were killed randomly and to some extent according to Bird's will. He killed a few people intentionally, the rest were incidental. This is vengeance against a society, not targeting a specific victim.

clipped from www.timesonline.co.uk He drove from Whitehaven through the villages of west Cumbria armed with a .22 hunting rifle with telescopic sights and a shotgun, opening fire randomly. Some victims were beckoned to his car to be killed, others were working by the roadside or passing on bicycles. In addition to the dead, 25 people were wounded, three of whom were in a critical condition in hospital. Others spoke of miraculous escapes. One female relative told The Times that the twins’ other brother, Brian Bird, was in a state of shock. She said: “He is sitting there knowing that one of his brothers has killed the other brother. God knows how that feels.” The incident echoed the massacres in Hungerford [1987] and Dunblane [1996], both of which led to tighter firearms legislation.Theresa May, the Home Secretary, is expected to address gun control issues when she makes a statement to the Commons today.