Calamity Schiffers

Film-maker Matthew Vaughn and his supermodel wife Claudia Schiffer must be wondering what lies in store for them next. First their son Caspar cuts his head badly at home, then Vaughn - the man behind cult hits Lock, Stock And Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch - is involved in a nasty road accident which leaves his bruised arm in a sling.

Vaughn was walking to an editing meeting for his latest movie, Layer Cake - which features Sienna Miller and Daniel Craig - at the Charlotte Street Hotel on Tuesday afternoon when he was hit by a motorcycle courier.

According to friend of Vaughn, he was sent flying into the air "like a rag doll", landing on top of the bike, burning his arm badly on the exhaust pipe.

Vaughn dusted himself down and still managed to make the meeting. That night his supermodel wife Claudia Schiffer made a makeshift sling for him at the couple's apartment and the next day, as our exclusive pictures show, Vaughn went to a Harley Street clinic for X-rays and burns treatment.

The arm was not broken but it will remain bandaged and in a sling for several days.

The accident happened only minutes after Vaughn and Schiffer had collected 17-month-old son Caspar from hospital in central London following an accident at home.

Friends of the couple say Caspar, who is just learning to walk, had stumbled headfirst into a wall at the couple's home in Bayswater and sustained a nasty cut. He was taken to hospital but doctors decided to bandage his head heavily instead of giving him stitches because they were considered too traumatic.

Vaughn's spokesman said: "It was a miracle Matthew wasn't badly hurt - he was literally thrown into the air when the bike hit him. Luckily he tells me he didn't break the arm, but it is very badly bruised and badly burned."

Schiffer, 33, announced a month ago that she was three months pregnant with her second child. She said yesterday that she hoped to have a girl, to give Caspar a sister.

Earlier this year a 21-year-old man was deported to Canada after stalking the couple at their Elizabethan manor house in Suffolk.