Washington: When a New York woman went into labour, she left home to hail a taxi for the hospital. But seconds later, she gave birth on a wintry Manhattan sidewalk.

Starting out as a true New Yorker in a hurry, the baby girl was in such a rush to enter the world that she could not wait for her mother Polly McCourt to get to the hospital on Monday afternoon.

Also in New York style, it happened in front of a television crew from Fox 5, who were en route to another story when they spotted the woman on Third Avenue and East 68th Street.

“She was like ‘oh my God, the baby’s coming’ and then I could see the baby’s head coming out,” one passer-by told Fox 5. “As soon as the head came out, by the time we laid her down on the street the baby was out.”

“Miracle on third avenue,” another witness told the network.

The new parents were reunited with the Good Samaritan who came to the mother’s aid.

Isabel Williams, 20, visited new parents Cian and Polly McCourt at their Manhattan flat on Thursday morning, according to a BBC report.

Williams had lent her coat to keep McCourt and newborn daughter Ila warm until emergency crews arrived.

The McCourts gave Ila the middle name Isabel.

Calling Williams a “humble girl”, McCourt told the BBC she wanted to “apologise for ruining her coat, and to thank her very much”.

“She gave up practically everything she had on her back,” she said of Williams, including her coat, jumper and a shirt on a cold winter day.

On Monday, Cian McCourt, who works for a law firm in New York, was stuck in traffic. When he arrived, he saw a crowd on the street and “guessed” the commotion involved his wife because he could not reach her on the phone.

He described going from “terror to relief” when he saw his wife and new baby were healthy.

The couple were already parents to two other children, Conor, six, and Adele, four.

As for naming their new daughter after Williams, McCourt said they had been undecided on a middle name and Cian McCourt liked Isabel.

“It was better than naming her 3rd Avenue,” he said with a laugh.