A judo teacher and former Olympian who lost a leg following a horrific bus crush has returned to work at school just six months on.

Josie Horton, 47, said her love for teaching had inspired her to fight back and return to the classroom despite the life-changing accident in Islington on March 27.

She praised the support of staff and pupils at Homefield Preparatory School in Sutton, where she returned to work last week.

Miss Horton was rushed to the Royal London Hospital following the collision near her home.

Surgeons took the devastating decision to amputate her leg as her blood was not clotting, putting her life at risk.

She returned home on Wednesday, May 25, following 12 weeks of rehabilitation, and was back in school for the start of the new term.

Miss Horton, a judo semi-finalist at the Barcelona 1992 Olympic Games, said: “My hospital have given me a new leg and it’s enabled me to get back into judo.

“I have been working so hard, busting a gut really, exercising in my wheel chair and with my new leg and its’s the school that makes it all worth it.

“That was what drove me on the whole way – getting back into work.

“I love teaching, it’s my life. When I was competing that was my life, and now teaching is.”

As she was recovering, the Western Road school raised funds to help support Miss Horton in her rehabilitation and held a fundraising events during the school’s summer term.

Staff, pupils and parents raked in thousands of pounds to help Miss Horton to pay for a van to make the former Olympian’s commute to work easier.

And Miss Horton has refused to take a back-seat approach to teaching and still demonstrates techniques to her pupils.

She said: “My whole approach is ‘you can’t step off the mat.’ I have worked hard practicing throws and demonstrations, but I do get the boys to think more and demonstrate as well.

“You have to keep evolving in teaching and, although it’s only been a week, the boys have totally taken to it and they are thinking more and doing more and my feeling is that they are really enjoying it.

“It’s like I’ve never been off the mat.”