A MAN leapt 20 ft from a first floor window this morning to flee a fire in a shop below.

Esse Sharif Jama, 39, was one of three men sleeping above the grocery store in Southampton, when the blaze broke out about 4.50am.

Mr Jama said:: "I got up then I open the door and there was an explosion and fire. I jumped out a back window."

It is unclear how the other men got out.

Mr Jama and his flat mate escaped injury but the other was treated for arm burns. A three-month-old infant baby two doors down was treated for smoke inhalation.

Residents told how an explosion at Emdad Food Stores, in Derby Road, St Mary's awoke them. They fled their houses to find the front of the shop blown out and huge flames jetting out.

Next door neighbour Tracy Brooks, 35, said: "I was just sat upstairs in bed and I heard this massive boom. The whole room just shook. I saw a bright orange flash out of the window.

"I ran straight to the window and I saw flames everywhere at the front of the shop."

She described how she alerted a family, who were sleeping through the drama in the flat below. They were two children aged four and five and a husband and wife. They were unhurt.