The girl was trapped under the front wheels of the train

Doctors were forced to amputate the 13-year-old's limb at a Merseyside railway station where the accident happened when the train could not be lifted off her.

The girl was hit by the train, which was on the Ormskirk line, just after 2130 BST on Monday and is being treated at Alder Hey Hospital.

On Tuesday British Transport Police were checking to see whether there is CCTV footage available of the incident at Orrell Park station.

Victim conscious

Firefighters had used high pressure airbags and jacks to try to raise the carriage off the girl but were unsuccessful.

Peter O'Donnell, of Merseyside Fire and Rescue, said the girl was conscious when crews arrived at the scene.

He told BBC North West Today: "When we arrived we found this girl trapped beneath the front wheels of the train.

"She was conscious and talking to paramedics and a doctor on site. She was asking for her mother and was understandably extremely upset."

Mr O'Donnell said it was the doctors treating the girl, who has not been named, that asked them to stop the attempt to lift the train.

Police were due to speak to railway staff and witnesses, who were with the girl at the time of the accident.

It is not clear how she ended up on the track, and officers are trying to establish whether she was simply playing, fell from the station platform, or was pushed.