Candle lorry fire coats A3029 in Bristol in wax Published duration 9 July 2014

media caption One of Bristol's busiest roads is closed after a lorry carrying candles catches fire.

One of Bristol's busiest roads has partly reopened after a lorry carrying candles caught fire, depositing a pool of melted wax on the road.

Callers to the BBC reported hearing a "loud explosion" and seeing "large plumes of smoke" over the Cumberland Basin just after 16:00 BST.

Other eye witnesses reported pieces of debris landing in a nearby park.

The driver told the BBC the lorry was carrying 46 pallets of Yankee candles and was heading for Italy.

image caption The lorry was on its way to Italy via Avonmouth Docks

image copyright Zsolt Husz image caption Brunel Way is expected to be closed for several hours

"I looked in my driver's mirror and I could see smoke, said driver Alan Feeney.

"I thought 'if I get out of the cab I can drop the trailer and save the load', but I couldn't. It just went up. There's a lot of flammable goods on it."

Avon and Somerset Police said it had reopened one lane of the outbound route following the "severe lorry fire" but the inbound route was expected to stay closed until later.

The A3029 Cumberland Basin system is one of the main traffic arteries in and out of the city towards Weston-super-Mare.

Related Topics Bristol