A KITTEN may have lost one of its nine lives hitching a 25-mile ride to the airport under a car bonnet.

Andrea Heywood, of Strawberry Lane, Tiptree, was shocked to discover the five-week-old black kitten underneath the bonnet of her car when she got to work at Stansted Airport.

She was discovered clinging to the engine after a passer-by heard her meowing from the bonnet of the parked car.

Andrea said: “I was in work and I had a phone call asking me to come to my car because they thought there was a cat trapped in the engine. I just thought ‘who’s winding me up?’.

“I got down there and there were rangers, police and security who could all hear this meowing.

“I unlocked the bonnet and it was tucked into the engine.

“We couldn’t get to her, but then she just jumped out and was crawling under other cars.

“It was unbelievable how she managed to survive.”

Andrea, 42, does not know how the kitten crawled into her Mini and does not know of anyone with kittens who lives near her.

She said: “I had my music playing really loud on my way to work, so I didn’t have a clue.”

Not knowing who she belonged to, Stansted Airport security adviser Becky Corris has adopted her and called her Jammy, because of her links to Tiptree and its famous jam factory.

Becky, 30, who lives near Harlow, said Jammy looked like she had sparked a security alert after security guards, police officers and airport staff helped out in the rescue.

She said: “We had a phone call to our control room saying they were trying to get this cat out from under a car bonnet.

“We took her back to the office but she kept crying.

“She sat on my lap in the end and stayed there for three hours, so she’s coming home with me now.”