A video has been posted online showing the moment a manhole cover exploded right next to a family in Northampton.

The CCTV footage from a nearby supermarket shows two children standing by a woman using a cash machine when a nearby manhole cover suddenly erupts. The family instinctively run away as the blast sends lumps of pavement into the air and destroys the sign of a local newsagent.

No-one was harmed in the incident. "An ambulance attended to treat a woman who had been walking in the area with two children when the cover flew into the air, but there were no serious injuries," a spokesperson for East Midlands Ambulance Service said.

Northampton Fire Service said that an electrical fault appears to be the cause of the explosion.

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