The whole of Eel Pie Island could have been blown up today after a gas canister valve came away from the bottle.

The stark warning came from  one of the welders who is part of a team of boat builders working on the island, who said there was enough gas on their van to blow up the island.

Fire engines, police and ambulance services attended the scene at about 11.30am and closed off the area while firefighters sprayed jets of water on the leaking canister to cool it down.

Welder Antonio Gay said: “If that went up I would not want to know, I don’t want to think about it.”

Mr Gay and his colleague Sergio Silva were unloading the bottles from their truck on Twickenham Riverside, just off Water Lane, when the valve came away from the bottle, causing Mr Silva to drop it.

Mr Silva said: “You never expect that to happen. It has never happened to me before.”

Antonio Gay said the workmen ran as soon as they realised the valve had broken and heard the acetylene gas escaping.

He said: “When you work with the canisters all the time you know an soon as you hear that hiss you are gone. There was enough there to blow the whole island up.”

Mr Gay said he panicked because he witnessed a similar incident in Hull when a lone gas canister leaked.

He said: “I have seen bottles blow a whole boat up – and that was just one bottle.”

Another boat builder Ben Howard, 29, said he had never seen Mr Gay move so quickly.

He said: “The way he ran makes me want to put him in the Olympics – Usain Bolt wouldn’t have a chance.”

Mr Howard said: “It was very scary. There were about 10 bottles on the lorry and six bottles on the trolley and they hold about 50 litres each. If it went off there would have been a massive explosion – it would have blown the whole island up.”

Koyes Mohammed, who had just parked his car on Water Lane, saw the gas canister fall.

He said: “As soon as I parked there they guy dropped the bottle. I thought one bottle dropping wouldn’t be a problem.”

No one was hurt in the incident and police are still on the scene.

Traffic has been affected in the area but only Water Lane was closed.