It was a quarter to two this morning (1st May) when a potent explosion ripped the Almuñécar early morning apart. The storeroom for fishing material just below the Peñón del Santo had disappeared into a heap of rubble.

Owing to the building being sheltered by the Peñón, the acoustics of the detonation was curious – whereas people living to the East of the Peñon probably slept through it, people to the West as far away as La Herradura were woken by the explosion.

The Chiringuito Tres Rejas, which stands a metre or so away from the storeroom has some of its windows blown in and tiles fell from an inside wall. The Chiringuito Calabré some 100 metres away also had its windows shattered. Even Hotel San Cristóbal reported damage.

Pieces of rubble were found up to 200 metres away.

Fortunately, owing to the hour, nobody was hurt – the chiringuitos were closed, the storeroom deserted, as was, obviously, the beach; had the explosion occurred at two in the afternoon, it would have been a different tale.

However, one lad that had been walking nearby reported that he had been blown off his feet.

The fire service, ambulances the Guardia Civil and Policia Local rushed to the scene only to experience considerable relief to find that there was nobody underneath the rubble

Just 24 hours later the TEDEX (Guardia Civil bomb disposal unit) confirmed that the explosion had been caused by a leaking camping-gas bottle, which put an end to the speculation that the explosion had been caused by drug runners to provoke a distraction.

(News: Almunecar, Costa Tropical, Granada, Andalucia)