Just over two years ago, when she was 13, Kaya McInnes was left fighting for life after a horrific smash that claimed the lives of her aunt and a family friend.

Kaya was originally thought to be dead too until medics at the scene of the smash found the tiniest flicker of life. She reached hospital in a deep coma to be placed on a life support system.

Her devastated mother, Leonora, travelled from Edinburgh to hospital in Inverness to be warned by concerned medics that her daughter still might not survive.

Kaya had suffered bleeding and swelling to her brain, a punctured lung, broken ribs and a fractured pelvis. Her aunt, Elizabeth Foley, from Falkirk, and family friend Jim Moffat, from Gilmerton – who had heroically tried to prevent a full frontal collision with the camper van heading towards them on the wrong side of the road – tragically lost their lives.

Incredibly, though, feisty James Gillespie pupil Kaya somehow pulled through. Within weeks and with a determination that stunned medical staff, she had learned to walk and talk all over again.

Full story from Edinburgh Evening News