© West Midlands Police / SWNSRubble: An elderly woman was pulled from the wreckage of the destroyed property
Emergency services rushed to the scene on Penn Road in Wolverhampton at 8.15am following the blast.
Firefighters found the 76-year-old pensioner had been trapped in the rubble of the gated £200,000 property.
The elderly woman was rescued from the wreckage almost two hours after the blast. She was taken to New Cross Hospital and was found to have suffered cuts and bruises and a broken ankle. Ambulance services say she was 'extraordinarily lucky' not to have been more seriously injured.
Dramatic pictures show the house reduced to rubble in between two unaffected two-storey houses.
The explosion was so severe that two drivers who were passing the scene when it happened suffered minor injuries.
© Google Street View / SWNSThe house before a huge explosion reduced it to rubble. Neighbours described the experience as 'like an earthquake'
- Penn Road resident Matt Eccles"I just heard a great big explosion that shook me out of bed and my neighbour told me that there had been a house that had exploded over the road."
"It was loud enough to wake me up, it was a proper explosion."
My wardrobes started shaking and I thought we were having an earthquake at first."- Plumber Dave Thomas"But when I looked outside and saw what had happened I realised it was an explosion. ""The two houses next door look like they haven't been touched so it must be a gas explosion."
Comment: Last month in the UK, another huge explosion completely destroyed a house in Buckinghamshire, with local Fire officer Adam Burch stating "An explosion of this kind is very rare, and especially to see a whole building collapse the way it has done".
There seems to have been an increase in the number of massive house explosions around the world in recent months, with investigators still attempting to determine the cause in many cases. Could a 'cosmic' source of ignition be responsible for some of these incidents?