Photo of angel takes mother in hospital as daughter on life- support makes miraculous recovery

A mother, whose daughter was fighting for her life, believes that a photograph taken in a hospital ward shows an angel.

Colleen Banton, from Charlotte, North Carolina, was facing the agonising decision of taking her daughter off a life-support machine when the 'miracle' occurred.

14-year-old Chelsea had been admitted to the hospital with pneumonia, but a series of subsequent infections and a collapsed lung left the teenager breathing with the help of a ventilator.

As friends and family gathered to say their final goodbyes, Mrs Banton was alerted to an unusual bright light by a nurse.

'On the monitor, there was this bright light,' she said. 'And I looked at it and I said, "Oh my goodness! It looks like an angel!"'

A first attempt at capturing the image with a digital camera was unsuccessful: 'The first picture wouldn't take,' she said.

The second time she succeeded, and the mother-of-two sought solace in the image while her daughter's oxygen mask was removed.

Both family and staff were stunned when Chelsea began breathing for herself.

'When they took the mask off of her, her stats went as high as they've ever been,' said Mrs Banton. 'Her color was good, and the doctors and nurses were amazed. The nurse practitioner who saw the image in the monitor said, "I've worked here 15 years, and I've never seen anything like it.'''

Two weeks later, the teenager was sent home from hospital, in time for her 15th birthday on Christmas day.

'What was so ironic is it was a rainy day,' Mrs Banton said of her discovery. 'It had been overcast all day. And the sun only came out at that point.'

'If they doubt it, that's fine... But I know what I saw, and the picture's untouched. I didn't make it up. That's just something that I believe.

'I believe that more people have changed since this happened. I know I have. I look at things differently than I used to – because I know God is in control.'

Mrs Banton revealed that she and her older daughter had been 'praying for a miracle' since Chelsea was born five weeks prematurely, and was given 36 hours to live.

'She spent the first four months in a neonatal intensive care unit,' recalled her mother.

Against the odds, Chelsea - who has suffered from pneumonia, hydrocephalus, requiring a shunt in her skull, and life-threatening viruses throughout her childhood - is now at high school.

'I'm learning that every day she's alive is a miracle.' said Mrs Banton.