A man was caught on CCTV damaging a petrol station in Swanson. The petrol station owner distributed the footage hoping to identify the man.

A man's repeated attempts to set fire to a West Auckland petrol station's pumps have been revealed in CCTV footage.

Footage from the GAS station in Swanson, shared on YouTube, showed a man lingering at the petrol pumps around 4am on Saturday before attempting to set a fire on the station forecourt.

The man remained on the forecourt for around 30 minutes and tried four or five times to "burn" the petrol, according to station owner Zahid Chaudhry.

JAVERIA C LIJIMA/YOUTUBE Footage from the GAS station in Swanson, Auckland, shared on YouTube, showed a man lingering at the petrol pumps around 4am on Saturday before attempting to set a fire on the station forecourt.

Chaudhry said the incident had caused "huge damage" to the station's pumps and caused a lot of stress for his family.

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He first noticed something was wrong when he saw damaged pumps when he arrived at work on Saturday morning. Rewinding the CCTV footage showed it could have been even worse.

Chaudhry had owned the station for more than 10 years and said he had never encountered vandalism to this extent.

"Kids do naughty things and push over my signs or put the nozzles on the ground, but nothing like this. This is very serious, he wants to destroy the business," Chaudhry said.

Had the man been successful in setting a fire, Chaudhry said the full petrol tanks would have caused a "big explosion" that would have caused a lot of damage in the residential neighbourhood.

The petrol station remained open but Chaudhry said that panels on the diesel pumps had been damaged. A lighter and a pump nozzle has also been used to break plastic screens, which displayed how much petrol is being pumped, on the other pumps.

Chaudhry said after reviewing the CCTV footage he passed on the information to police and was waiting to hear the outcome.

Police said they had received a report of wilful damage at the petrol station on Swanson Rd and an investigation was underway.