Video of a house explosion in Castleford, West Yorkshire, has been released by the fire service (Published on Jul 15, 2011).
Right before the explosion, a group of firefighters just rescued a bunch of people from their houses after a report of a kitchen fire. While they were still cleaning up, the house exploded with an incredible force. Several bursts of flame, flying glass, the works. Two of the houses were partly destroyed and four had significant damage from the blast.
The cause of this explosion was a cooper thief who cut a nearby overhead line. This produced an electrical disturbance that reacted with the gas lines in the houses. Add some electrical sparks to highly combustible gas and you get a big boom. Thankfully, no one was seriously hurt in the blast
See also …
BBC Castleford explosion: Copper cabling theft linked to incident
