A SECURITY guard was robbed at gunpoint in broad daylight outside a supermarket yesterday.

The 25-year-old worker was targeted outside at an Asda store in Kilmarnock.

He was approached at about midday in Queens Drive Retail Park and threatened with a firearm.

The gunman demanded that the guard hand over a security case which contained a four-figure sum of money.

The robber then fled in a green, R-registration Ford Escort, possibly a Mk4 or Mk5 model.

No shots were fired during the incident and the security guard was unhurt.

Last night, police appealed for any witnesses to the robbery to come forward.

The gunman is described as white, aged in his 30s, about 5ft 5in to 5ft 8in tall and of slim to medium build. He was wearing a black woollen hat, checked scarf, grey top, dark-coloured tracksuit bottoms and white training shoes.

Meanwhile, police have launched an attempted murder inquiry after a man was set upon in the street by a gang of five or six men with scarves over their faces as he repaired his car.

The 20-year-old is in a critical condition in hospital with head injuries after the attack in Glasgow’s Blackhill district on Thursday night. Police described the attack as “particularly violent and unprovoked”.

AMILLIA Taylor should not have even been born until next month. But she will soon be home with her parents, after a four-month fight for survival that has earned her a title as the world’s most miraculous baby.

Born in October after just 21 weeks and six days in her mother’s womb, she is the first baby to survive such a premature delivery, with previous records standing at 22 weeks and above.

Her parents, who went through in-vitro fertilisation treatment to conceive, chose the name Amillia for their 10oz infant because they read that it means “resilient”.

Now aged 17 weeks, Amillia weighs 4lb 8oz and doctors hope to allow her home soon, declaring that she has lived up to her name and beaten the medical odds.

“We weren’t too optimistic. But she proved us all wrong,” said Dr William Smalling, one of the neonatologists who brought her through her battle for life at the Baptist Children’s Hospital in Miami, Florida.

He added: “She’s going to be in a normal crib, she’s going to have normal feedings, she’s taking all her feedings from a bottle,” said Dr Smalling.

Medical guidelines state that babies born at less than 22 weeks’ gestation should not be resuscitated, because they are not viable until 23 weeks. A normal pregnancy lasts between 37 and 40 weeks.

So in October last year, when Sonja Taylor, 37, realised that she was going into labour just 19 weeks into her pregnancy, she kept quiet about her real due date in an attempt to give her child a fighting chance.

Doctors were unable to delay her birth and delivered Amillia by Caesarean section on 24 October. Seeing her struggling to breathe on her own and hearing her rasped attempts at crying, they believed that she must be 23 weeks.

Only when they checked Mrs Taylor’s IVF records, in which a fertility doctor had recorded the exact date of implantation, did they discover just what they had on their hands.

Amillia weighed 10oz and measured 9.5in. Her lungs were strained, her paper-thin skin ripped, she had suffered a mild brain haemorrhage and her left ear and scalp were hanging off.

Amillia still requires medication and supplemental oxygen to help her lungs, but doctors said yesterday that her prognosis is “excellent” and that she should lead a normal life.

For her mother, who worked as a teacher prior to the birth, and father Eddie, 46, an electrical engineer, they dared not even think the future about as they watched their daughter struggling for life.

“I’m still in amazement,” said Mrs Taylor. “It was hard to imagine she would get this far. But now she is beginning to look like a real baby. Even though she’s only four pounds, she looks plump to me.”

Mr Taylor said: “Her name means resilience. She fought for her life. By the grace of God, she’s here.”

The Guinness Book of World Records lists the most premature baby to survive delivery as James Gill of Canada, who was born at 22 weeks and is now aged 19. The University of Iowa, which keeps a national database of premature births, reveals that no baby born at less than 23 weeks’ gestation in the US has ever survived.

Dr Smalling said: “What we learned is that we can work on babies that are small, even though it was thought to be technically impossible. It may be that we need to reconsider our standard for viability in light of Amillia’s case. The technology that we have available to save these premature babies has improved dramatically.”