This is the moment flames tear through a lakeside grassland filled with campers after a ruptured gas pipeline exploded as adults and children fled in panic.

The incident happened near Baima Lake in the Binjiang district of Hangzhou, a city in Zhejiang province in eastern China on 18th January.

Video from the scene shows intense flames reaching the height of small trees, with burning grass and a clear line of fire cutting across the middle of the road, while thick black smoke rises into the air.

Several tents are seen pitched on the grass as the fire spreads, with campers urgently packing up and running away as the blaze advances from the roadside towards the lawn.

Witnesses said that construction workers accidentally hit a pipeline and caused a gas leak, which resulted in a loud explosion.

Emergency services were called and crews shut off the control valves and extinguished the fire.

The incident disrupted gas supplies to 1,494 households and one public building, with repairs completed later that night and supplies fully restored.

(Aloysius Fernandes / Asiawire)