A COMPANY is to face health and safety charges following a gas explosion in Chippenham which left Kyle Roe with life changing injuries.

The Health and Safety Executive is prosecuting Prestige EA Ltd and Roderick Standing following the explosion which happened on October 18, 2017 in Market Place, Chippenham.

The defendants are charged with breaching Section 3 of the Health and Safety at Work Act and are due before Salisbury Magistrates’ Court on 16 December 2019.

Kyle, 21, suffered 87% burns to his body in an explosion in his newly-refurbished flat in Chippenham.

Mr Roe was in an induced coma for seven weeks and has since undergone many skin grafts at a burns unit in Swansea.

Last year on the first anniversary of the explosion Mr Roe and his mum Tracy spoke about the trauma he had suffered and the challenges still facing him.

His mother said Kyle, a former pupil of Sheldon School who worked at Morrisons, wanted prosecutions to go ahead. She said: "Kyle is very focused on the prosecutions because he did nothing wrong except turn a light switch on.”

She explained that Kyle had been suffering mentally as well as physically since the explosion.

Tracy said: "The hardest part for him is trying to accept what his new life is going to be compared to what it would have been. He was a very sporty person, very outgoing and he had a career. He had a motorbike that he loved which he will never ride again.

“He doesn’t like how his body now looks, and he must accept he looks different, which he hasn’t yet.

After the explosion, Kyle’s dad, Chris, become his full time carer, and his three brothers, Kallum, 23, Connor, 14, and Findlay, nine, found it tough coming to terms with Kyle’s injuries.