Gas cylinder blaze drama near Market Drayton homes
About 15 homes, a supermarket and businesses were evacuated and a 200-metre cordon set up after a fire broke out involving gas cylinders on an industrial estate in Shropshire.
The fire broke out at about 1pm yesterday at Minshall Construction on the Adderley Road Industrial Estate in Market Drayton, and involved highly flammable acetylene and oxygen cylinders and firefighters set up the exclusion zone.
Families were evacuated from their homes and staff and customers were asked to leave the nearby Morrisons supermarket in Maer Lane along with employees from food factory Palethorpes.
But despite the alarm being raised a number of people working at nearby businesses refused to leave their premises.
Crews remained at the scene overnight making sure everything was safe. The fire broke out shortly before 1pm yesterday and fire crews left the scene at about 8am today.
John Dasgupta, area manager for Shropshire Fire and Rescue, said: "When we got the call we declared it a major incident and the police set up an exclusion area of 200m."
