Leah Washington, who turned 18 last month, said it was difficult to watch her friends prepare to leave for university when her life had changed so dramatically.

In her first interview since the crash, she said: "I'm nervous for the future. My life is on hold while my friends are moving forward, having their own cars and leaving home.

"I'll have a different path and a different life. Plans that you've thought about in your head for the future ... They're going to be different now, because of what's happened."

Miss Washington from Barnsley, who lost her left leg above the knee after the Smiler ride crashed with an empty carriage on June 2, was one of five people, including her boyfriend Joe Pugh, seriously injured in the accident.

During the four-hour rescue operation medics described how she nearly died twice, first when they feared she may go into cardiac arrest and second when her airways became blocked. 

The rescue attempt was so complicated that Dr Ben Clarke said it "was like playing Jenga with human beings."

"The carriage was hanging at a 45-degree angle and if you removed a bit of metal, all four front row victims would have fallen out," he said. 

Miss Washington also lost a quarter of her blood while she was trapped on the ride and would have died had the weather been colder. 

Recalling the accident, Miss Washington said she was in the front of the carriage when the ride stopped for ten minutes and then continued on its course. 

Then she saw another carriage blocking the route and knew it was "going to end badly". She recalled thinking it "wouldn't be nice, like a bumper car ride."

After the collision, her carriage was suspended in the air and she started to lose the feeling in her leg.

In the interview with the Mail on Sunday, she said: "I looked down at my left leg and it was pushed up with the bar digging into it. There was a bit of flesh on the seat in front and I could feel the bone in my knee sticking out.

"I started panicking and screaming then. I was petrified. Joe was trying to calm me down. I was saying, 'My mum's going to have a heart attack when she realises what's happened'."

Later in hospital, she begged the surgeon not to tell her she had lost a limb.

She told the paper: "It took me a long time to look at my injury. When I did, I burst into tears."

She is now eager to get a prosthetic leg because crutches are tiring and she doesn’t like being in a wheelchair as people often stare.

"I’m 18 - I can't stand not being independent. My grandad offered me a blanket in my wheelchair and I said, 'No, I’m not 90'. My life is just one long list of physio and hospital appointments. But I’ve got to move on and live with it."