TEHRAN — A huge explosion took place during an underground subway tunnel excavation project early morning on Friday in Shahran district, western Tehran, and claimed two lives.

While using the excavator the two subway workers accidentally hit the gas pipeline which resulted in the massive explosion and their unfortunate death, a city councilor told Mehr news agency.

“Unfortunately it took us 40 minutes to stop the gas supply to the district which must be normally three to four minutes top,” Abolfazl Qena’ati regretted.

Qena’ati went on to say that the explosion caused some damages to the adjacent residential buildings as well as an office building but thankfully it occurred at a fair distance from the residential area otherwise the damage would be far worse.

The explosion has created a whole 50 meters deep in a 100-meter area and it took 2 hours for the firefighters to extinguish the fire. It has also done some damages to the electricity greed and water pipes of the area and the phone lines are still cut off. 

As a safety measure the houses at the proximity of the explosion are evacuated and the streets located in this area are closed until further notice.

According to IRNA, a crisis management session in attendance of Tehran’s Mayor Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf is scheduled to convene to respond to this incident.

MQ/MG