DISASTER was narrowly averted when a 12-ton tanker ploughed through the wall of a pensioner's home in Darwen.

This photo, taken on February 5, 1980, shows the aftermath of the vehicle crashing into a house wall.

The tanker had nose-dived through the wall and onto the lounge carpet of Elizabeth House in Sudellside Street, but miraculously nobody was hurt.

Reports at the time said the cause of the accident was unknown.

Driver Alan Thomson, himself of Sudellside Street, said: "I parked it about 30 yards from the home and it had been there about 40 minutes."

The tanker, it seemed, slipped away from its parking spot at the bottom of Rose Street and slid across Sudellside Street, sweeping through a brick wall and iron railings before dropping onto Elizabeth House.

Matron at the home Mrs Vivien Hopwood said: "I was in the kitchen when I heard the bang.

"I came running out and there was a wagon in the room."

Elizabeth House accommodated about 30 old people and normally there would have been 10 people in the room.

Mrs Hopwood said: "If they had been sitting around the lounge as usual I doubt if they would have all escaped.

"They would not have had time to move."