A couple were left badly burnt after fleeing for their lives when their fireplace exploded, engulfing their home in an “orange fireball”.
Angela Palit, 59, described how she was blown across the kitchen, and thought she was going to die as her hair caught fire and she felt her face burning.
The horror unfolded after she arrived home to Penarth Marina, Vale of Glamorgan, from work and asked her husband, former Wales reporter Nick Palit, 60, to put the fire on so she could enjoy a glass of wine.
South Wales Fire and Rescue Service has been asked to comment on the blaze and bioethanol fires, such as the one that caused the explosion.
“I caught a fireball really that I was not expecting,” recalled Angela on Radio Wales.
“I was trying to put it out with a damp cloth, and it just exploded at me as I was walking towards it, and just blew me across the kitchen.
“I ended up on the floor. My hair was on fire, my face was burning, I thought I was going to die.
“And then Nick just dragged me out and said ‘we need to get out’.”
It was the speed “that really, really shocked us” added Nick, describing the events of last Tuesday, 16 September.
He described it as a bioethanol fireplace that does not need a chimney flue, where liquid is poured on to a cotton gauze to create a “candle effect”.
“We lit it as we always have done,” Nick added.
“We probably haven’t used it for about five months because it’s been summer, and it started.
Smoke, black smoke was coming off it, which was very unusual, and the smoke alarm went off almost immediately.”
Nick turned the fire off and went to open the patio doors to let the smoke out, adding: “I heard her screaming.
“I turned around and saw her on the floor, I saw her flying through the air, and grabbed her.”
Nick PalitHe described how they ran through the garden gate as he dialled 999, saying: “As we were on the phone to the emergency services, within less than a minute it was engulfed in an orange fireball, the whole downstairs of the house.”
The couple were initially treated by paramedics at the scene, then at the University Hospital of Wales in Cardiff, before being sent to the specialist burns unit at Swansea’s Morriston Hospital.
Angela suffered burns to her face and hands, while falling debris left Nick with burns on his arm and elbow.
The couple are now living temporarily in Airbnb accommodation, and have been told by insurers it will take at least six months for their home to be rebuilt.
Nick PalitIn what Nick described as a “double whammy”, the couple had four e-bikes, worth hundreds, that they chained together outside their home after the blaze.
When they returned from treatment on Tuesday, they were gone.
“It’s obvious to anyone that’s driven past, that this house has sustained a fire and is probably abandoned,” said Nick.
“Obviously the thieves have come along and they must have had a van and just lifted them up completely and there were four together chained together.
“The security cameras, the security lights, all of that stuff that would normally be protecting it, wasn’t there.”
To add insult to injury, a security tracker alerted Nick to where his bikes were – in a property two miles (3.2km) away.
He arranged to meet police officers at the building, which was a small block of flats that had six homes in it.
“But because we couldn’t pinpoint which one, they weren’t prepared to knock doors to find out,” he said.
So despite being within metres of the bikes, they were not able to establish which of the flats they were in, and recover them.
South Wales Police has been asked to comment on the thefts.
