A YATE family in shock after their freezer exploded causing a devastating fire in their garage has warned others to make their outbuildings safe.

Andy and Rachel Warren awoke to the sound of an exploding tyre on a classic car kept in the garage adjacent to their house in Windsor Drive in the early hours of Monday morning.

“I could just see flames outside,” Mr Warren told the Gazette. “I didn’t know where they had come from.

"My wife was shouting get out, get out.”

The family’s freezer had exploded, despite being fitted with an earth leakage trip, instantly bursting into flames and setting fire to Mr Warren’s treasured classic car, a Morris Oxford he has previously entered into Chipping Sodbury classic car run.

“The tyre exploded which is what woke my wife up,” said electrician Mr Warren. “It was the intensity of it which was so shocking. The damage to the car was pretty severe but we had flammable things stored in the garage including a petrol can for the lawn mower and a gas bottle for camping.

“We have smoke alarms in the house but I never thought to put them in the garage. It has freaked us out and we couldn’t sleep at all on Monday night.”

The couple, and their daughters aged 21 and 18, and daughter’s boyfriend aged 22, all managed to get out of the house safely when the fire broke out at 5am.

Avon Fire and Rescue Service was on the scene within minutes and managed to get the garage blaze under control without the fire affecting the family’s home of 24 years.

“The fire service was brilliant,” said Mr Warren. “They said although it is rare these things do happen. It is a real shame about the car but we are all okay and that is main thing. There is a bit of a smoke smell but otherwise no problem with the house.

“You just don’t think a freezer in your garage is such a sleeping danger. You have it running all night and don’t think about it. We want to warn other people to put smoke alarms in their garages as well as their homes and move flammables away from their freezers.

“We don’t want anyone to go through what we did.”

He added: “Our neighbours were fantastic. It shows how good the residents in Windsor Drive are.”

Neighbour David Boulton said he was woken by Mrs Warren knocking on the door.

“She was shouting my house is on fire,” he told the Gazette. “I ran out in the street, there was lots of smoke and the fire brigade had just turned up.”

He added: “I am turning the freezer in our garage off. It is just too dodgy to have it running away there quietly.”

Fire service spokesman Simon Hatch said firefighters from Yate and Kingswood stations used two sets of breathing apparatus, one high pressure hose reel, a 45mm jet and a positive pressure ventilation kit to bring the blaze under control.

Added Mr Hatch: “Crews remained at the property after the fire had been extinguished and gave fire safety advice to the occupants and tested the smoke alarms.”