'The Gas Bottle Incident'

We were invited around to our good friends Bill & Meg's house for a Christmas lunch today with a few of their other close friends. The day started out wonderfully with some good banter and beer, nibbles and nuts, but it all turned pear shaped when Bill went to light up the gas BBQ to cook the meat for lunch.

There must have been a leak in the hose connection and lighting the BBQ has lit up the leaking gas from the bottle. Bill has tried to shut off the gas bottle at the tap on top and ended up in a fireball as the hose burnt through very quickly as the gas was now pouring out of the hose and shooting flames way into the air along the side of the house. Meg, thinking quickly ran into the house and grabbed their fire extinguisher to try to extinguish the flames, but it was no good, the heat had now built up too much and everytime Meg stopped spraying the escaping gas lit up again, until finally the extinguisher ran out. Then she grabbed the fire blanket to try to stop it, again no good. Finally, after a few minutes the gas started to run out and I pulled the Barbecue away from the house and we got the garden house out and put the last of the flames out. Meanwhile Meg was on the phone to the fire brigade who turned up pretty quickly. They arrived and thoroughly checked everything out to make sure it was now safe and they they went to the aid of Bill who was taken inside and put into the shower with burns to his arms, hands, face & feet. He was treated at the house by the firemen initially, but they then called an ambulance to the house. Two paramedics did some more treatment to Bill at the house and inside the ambulance before taking him off to the Austin Hospital accompanied by his Nephew Brendan.

The only news that we had heard throughout the afternoon was that he had been put on a drip and was being given morphine for the pain. Brendan called again late in the day and said they they were expected to release Bill from Hospital later tonight.

I reckon he's going to be in some pain for a while with the burns he received, but thankfully it wasn't worse and the fire brigade and paramedics did a superb job.

Wasn't quite the relaxed day we had planned on, but it's one that will stick in our memories for sure.

Hope Bill's feeling a bit better tomorrow.