At least 25 people were injured in an explosion in a central residential area of the Swedish city of Gothenburg early on Tuesday.
Four people suffered serious injuries during the incident.
The explosion took place just before 5 a.m. in the Annedal district in central Goteborg, Sweden’s second-largest city.
Fires spread to several apartments, and crews from the local fire department were still working to extinguish the flames as of 9 a.m.
The explosion forced the evacuation of hundreds more, police and rescue workers said.
Police spokesman Stefan Gustafsson told The Associated Press that eight people remain in hospital.
However, the immediate cause of the blast and blaze is still unclear.
Police said they had opened an investigation but could not give more details.
Emergency services said they were working to evacuate people and put out fires in the building.
They ruled out a gas leak but refrained from speculating on the cause of the explosion.
Anja Almen, who lives in the building, said she heard a commotion from the street just after 5:00a.m. — around 15 minutes after the explosion.
“I went out on the balcony. There was smoke everywhere, from every stairwell,” she said by phone from a nearby church to which she and other tenants took refuge. “Fire trucks with ladders were pulling people from apartments.”
