British mother, 26, beats 200 million to one odds to give birth to naturally- conceived identical triplets

A mother beat staggering odds of 200 million to one to give birth to naturally conceived identical triplets - doubling the size of her family overnight.

Shocked Katie Craw, 26, from Pentre Maelor, Wales, said she and partner Rob Ellis almost fainted when they were told their second child was actually three at their 12-week scan, the Daily Mail reports.

Usually triplets are non identical and are created when two eggs are fertilised and one goes on to grow into twins.

But Katie is one of just a handful of women in Britain to have identical triplets - known as monozygotic - where the fertilised egg splits into three after conception.

It makes miracle tots Tommy, Joshua and Eddie - born by emergency cesarean on February 9 - genetically identical.

Katie and Rob initially had to leave the tots' hospital tags on in order to tell them apart.

The pregnancy went swimmingly, with Katie seeing her midwife weekly and being scanned every fortnight to make sure the little ones were developing properly.