Shrewsbury firm back to normal after blaze drama

Business was back to normal today at a Shrewsbury breakdown recovery garage after a cordon was removed at the weekend following a blaze at the premises.

A 200-yard cordon was put around EA Downes & Sons Ltd and Central Garage in Hereford Road, Meole Brace, on Friday afternoon amid fears cylinders at the site could explode.

It was relaxed after a short time to just cover EA Downes and the neighbouring BP garage but remained in place for about 24 hours.

Bosses of EA Downes today said the cordon was lifted on Saturday afternoon.

Director Clive Pratt said: "There was a small fire involving some petrol and an oil drum where a spark ig-nited. It obviously did some smoke damage to the building and it's damaged a couple of tools in the workshop but everything else is fine."

Mr Pratt said because the fire had started close to the oxygen acetylene cylinders, which are used for welding, the fire service monitored the situation for 24 hours to ensure an explosion did not occur.