Wong Tai Sin garage blast: taxi's gas tank was still intact despite three-hour blaze

The gas tank of the taxi that was inside a Wong Tai Sin garage during an explosion remained intact - despite being in a fire that raged for almost three hours, a top official said.

Electrical and Mechanical Services Department director Frank Chan Fan, said yesterday that further tests would be conducted to find out if gas had leaked from the tank after police sources said on Monday they believed a leak was behind the blast.

"Even after [burning] for two to three hours, the tank remained intact. It shows the tanks of LPG vehicles in Hong Kong are safe," Chan said, after a meeting with Federation of Trade Unions lawmaker Tang Ka-piu yesterday.

Three people were killed in the explosion on Sunday, which bystanders said was like a bomb going off.

Tang said the government needed to step up inspection of garages to find out if staff repaired vehicles' LPG tanks without a valid licence.

In their meeting, Chan told Tang that the Electrical and Mechanical Services Department had inspected only about 500 of the 2,700 garages in Hong Kong since 2013.

"And [Chan] said that only one garage has been prosecuted in the past three years," Tang said, adding that the garage in question was prosecuted because its staff were working on LPG tanks without a valid licence.