One dead, five injured after UK power station collapse

One person has died, three are missing and five are in hospital following the collapse of part of a disused power station in Didcot, southern England on Tuesday, the fire service said.

Workers were preparing the ten-story building for demolition when it collapsed around 1600 GMT, Nathan Travis, deputy chief fire officer of Oxfordshire Fire & Rescue Service told reporters at the scene.

He said there were no explosives on the site at the time of the collapse. Three people are believed to be trapped under the rubble.

"Dogs are doing a systematic search of the rubble," said Travis.

The power station, which closed in 2013, had three large cooling towers that were demolished in 2014. The rest of the station was being decommissioned.

David Cooke, whose company Thames Cryogenics has a building overlooking the power station, said: "Our building shook and as we looked out of the window, the end of the main turbine hall collapsed in a huge pile of dust."

"It totally obscured the towers and must have drifted across the roads and main rail line. What's left looks a tangled mess."

Photos from the scene appear to show that a large section of the station had collapsed.

Around 50 people were treated for dust inhalation at the scene.

Casualties were taken to the John Radcliffe Hospital in nearby Oxford, said Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust.