Stark reminder of day tragedy struck street

PILE OF RUBBLE REMAINS AT SCENE OF EXPLOSION THAT CLAIMED MAN'S LIFE AND LEFT HOMES DEVASTATED

- By OLIVER PRIDMORE

MARLENE Bradley walks out into her back garden every day. The 58-year-old might be pegging out a line of washing, tending to her garden or taking her dog outside.

Whatever she does there, for the past three months Marlene has been surrounded by demolished houses and piles of rubble.

Thronged with emergency services and then demolition workers, John Street in Worksop is now an eerily quiet road after being rocked by a huge explosion on April 12.

Marlene and her neighbours, an elderly couple who have lived in their home for nearly 60 years, are now the only ones left on her side of the road at the end of John Street. Three houses have been demolished and many others are too dangerous to be reoccupied yet.

On the front of nearly all the houses, either on the brickwork or right on the front door, you can still see the words 'clear' or 'evac' written in pen or chalk. Not just on John Street, but row after row of houses in the area feature a chalked 'C' on their frontage to mark them as 'clear' - used by emergency services in April to indicate when a home was safe to reenter.

"If it didn’t say clear on the door, then you couldn't go back into the house", says Marlene, who had to take six weeks off work after the explosion as she battled PTSD.

Still on medication for the condition, Marlene says she remains unable to sleep properly at night after the tragedy that turned the street she has lived on for nearly 20 years into a "war zone".

Just three houses separate Marlene's property from 26 John Street, where the huge explosion on April 12 took place. David Howard, a 53-year-old father and grandfather, described by one neighbour as the "nicest bloke you could ever meet", lost his life in the explosion.

A floral tribute simply reading "DAD" in the colours of David's beloved Newcastle United remains on the pavement outside what was 26 John Street.