A WOMAN who went to walk her dogs in a Hurn nature spot was left horrified after what was believed to be an air rifle shot narrowly missed her head.

Jane Prosser, 45, drove to Ramsdown Forest at around 7am on Thursday to take her two Jack Russells for their morning walk, but when she went to her boot to let them out she suddenly heard an “almighty bang”.

She said: “It was so loud it made me duck and cover my head with my hands. At first I thought someone had thrown a stone or a pine cone had fallen on the car, but there was no evidence of that.

“I looked up and, to my horror, I realised it must have been a bullet of some sort as there was a big hole, just smaller than a football, in the rear windscreen. It was about 10cm away from where my head was. If I had stepped just a bit to the right, god knows what would have happened to me.”

Jane, a mum-of-two, said she had been visiting Ramsdown twice a day for years and had never experienced anything like this there before.

After the window smashed, she called her dogs – who were so spooked, they ran away – and put them in the front of her car and drove home.

“It was such a shock. I couldn’t see anyone around when it happened and got so frightened that I went home. The glass completely crumbled on the drive back.

“I called the police who came to my home and asked what had happened. The officer saw my window and said it looked like an air rifle had shot it.

“He sent officers to the scene to investigate and confirmed they could find nobody in the vicinity. They reassured me this was an isolated incident, but I’m a bit concerned someone is still out there with an air rifle as a lot of people go to Ramsdown, often on their own or with children.”

Despite her ordeal, Jane added she was not going to stop visiting the area, which she calls her “little sanctuary”.

Police Constable Andy Kennedy, of Christchurch police, is asking anyone who saw or heard anything suspicious in the area to come forward.

“The victim did not see anyone or hear anything apart from the glass smashing and it is not known what caused the damage.”