Police launched a missing persons hunt after a four-year-old girl 'vanished' on a school trip - before she was found ASLEEP on the coach.
Jenny Taylor has expressed her horror after daughter Mila was left behind after taking a doze on the way back from a day trip to a farm.
Terrified Jenny says she has lost “all trust” in the school after claiming teachers failed to do a head count or check if any pupils remained on board when the bus returned.
And she said her daughter would never go back to the school after the incident.
Mila travelled without any teacher supervision from Plymouth, Devon to Ivybridge, before another adult boarded the coach and eventually found her.
Jenny, 24, says she keeps “re-living” the moment she found out her child was missing.
She said: “I was in the playground with my three-year-old son ready to pick her up.
“The school was evacuated, and I just stood there looking around and thinking ‘Where’s my child?’
“When a teacher came running out to me really upset, I knew something was wrong, but I didn’t know what.”
After realising Mila wasn’t with the rest of her schoolmates, teachers conducted a search of the school and contacted police when they decided she must still be on the coach.
Jenny, who works as a cleaner at a nearby school, said: “I started crying. It wouldn’t sink in.
“I ran out and looked around everywhere. I looked up and down the road and it felt like forever before a teacher came running out and told me Mila had been found on the coach, fast asleep.
“I phoned my mum and asked her to stay with my son, and then one of the teachers drove me to the Yelverton shops where we met the coach driver.
“When we got there, I said 'thank you' so much to the coach driver for bringing her back to me, but it was so strange grabbing my daughter back from somebody else.
“I couldn’t speak. I’ve lost all trust in the school. My children are everything to me.”
Jenny is due to get married to her partner and father of her two children on Saturday, but says she can’t stop thinking about the “horrible” situation her family has been put through.
She said: “I was feeling so happy when I was waiting on the playground; I remember every second of it - but once the teacher came running out my brain just went and that was it. I can’t think of anything else.”
Mila didn’t go to school today, and Jenny says she won’t be returning.
She said: “I have asked her if she wants to go to a new school and she has said yes.
“How am I supposed to take her down and drop her off and let her go again?
“It doesn’t matter what school I take her to, it will take ages before I can trust them the slightest bit.
“All the teachers blamed each other and the police said there is going to be questioning done, and for things to be put in place so it never happens again.
“Procedures have to be put in place - it’s no excuse.
“When somebody tells you they’ve lost your child, well that’s my child gone. All sorts go through your head; they’re never coming back. It’s the worst feeling in the world.”
Police say they were called to the school around 3.30pm on Monday after the girl did not return to her class following a school trip to Pennywell Farm.
Officers were told the girl was among her class when the contracted coach took them to the animal centre in Buckfastleigh.
However, teachers noticed the child was missing when they returned to the school at 2.50pm and police were called following a search.
A Devon and Cornwall Police spokesman said: “We received reports that one of the schoolchildren appeared to be missing following a school trip.
“After a brief search, we managed to locate the pupil, who had fallen asleep and was not with the rest of the children who had been dropped off at school.
“The child and her mum have been reunited and are both safe and well.
“Police are currently working with the headteacher at the school to ensure this incident does not happen again and ensure appropriate safeguarding measures are put in place.
"Arrangements were made and an adult collected the girl at a location in Yelverton."
The school have not yet released a statement.