Woman hit by golf ball while waiting for tram

A WOMAN was struck in the face by a golf ball while waiting for a tram near World of Golf, Croydon.

Anne Mulholland, 66, was waiting at Arena tram stop with her sister and cousin when the incident occurred.

The ball, which flew around 400 yards, cleared the netting before it bounced off a tram shelter and struck Anne on the chin, causing bruising and bleeding from her gums. While her relatives attended to her, three more balls flew over the netting near them.

Anne said: “Whoever it was must have been a hell of a golfer. It came from nowhere and I didn’t see it. If I had seen it I would have ducked.

“I am lucky it just hit my chin. If it had hit my eyes or brain I would be dead right now. We are so paranoid to stand at that tram stop now because of what happened. It could have been a child or someone old.”

Anne's sister, 69-year-old Ms Stork, is now keen to work with World of Golf and Transport for London to ensure a similar incident does not happen again.

“There was a witness who was really shaken up because she lives in the flats nearby and almost on a daily basis waits at that stop with her daughter and her grandchildren.

“Will it take something worse than what happened to my sister to get something done about it?”

World of Golf said it was the first incident of this kind and over 150 million balls had been hit in six years.

Grant Wright, chief executive of World of Golf, said there would be a full investigation, adding: “I am extremely sorry this happened and all of us at World of Golf are shocked balls may have escaped our protective netting.”