Bullet felt like cricket ball: ABC journo

Australian journalist Adam Harvey, who was hit in the neck by a bullet in a Philippine war zone, says the shot felt like a cricket ball had hit him.

Adam Harvey

Australian journalist Adam Harvey has been hit by a stray bullet in the Philippine city of Marawi. (AAP)

An Australian journalist says it felt like he had been hit in the neck by a cricket ball when a "big, dull thud" knocked him to the ground in a Philippines war zone.

ABC foreign correspondent Adam Harvey had been shot in the neck, with the bullet now lodged behind his jaw just inches from his spine.

Harvey was injured on Thursday in Marawi, where Philippine military forces are working to take back parts of the city from Islamic State.

"It felt like I had been hit in the head with a cricket ball ... that kind of big, dull thud that hurt, but I didn't black out," Harvey told ABC radio.

"The bullet is still in my neck but luckily it missed everything important and is just lodged behind my jaw."

Harvey posted a picture to Twitter of an X-ray showing the bullet lodged in his neck, with the caption "Lucky".

"Thanks everyone - I'm okay. Bullet is still in my neck, but it missed everything important," Harvey tweeted separately.

He said he initially thought he had been hit by shrapnel in what was considered a relatively safe compound some way away from the fighting.

"We were joking about it a few minutes later but it turned a bit more serious when I saw the X-ray," he said.

Harvey said the Marawi hospital he was being treated in came under attack while he was there, with gunfire heard outside the building.

The journalist's sister, Claire Harvey, told 2GB radio her brother would need surgery, which she hoped would occur in Singapore.

"It looks like this bullet has got him in the gap between the bottom of his helmet and the top of his (protective) vest," she said.

An ABC News spokesman confirmed Harvey was receiving medical treatment for the injury, which was described as not serious.

A video uploaded by Filipino radio station DDZB Super Radyo showed the journalist wearing a neck brace and helmet while being mobbed by local reporters.

"I've just gone to get an X-ray to get it checked out," Harvey said in the video posted on Twitter by the station.


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Source: AAP



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