A lorry carrying aerosol cans caught fire and ‘exploded’ on the M11 shutting down the motorway for hours.

Firefighters and police rushed to the southbound carriageway between Duxford (Junction 10) and Stansted Airport (Junction 8) at 4.57pm yesterday (July 14) and discovered an HGV completely alight.

"The articulated lorry was carrying aerosol cans which exploded and scattered across both side of the carriageway,” explained Essex Fire and Rescue Service station manager Dave Bond.

He added: “Thankfully the driver was not badly hurt.”

The explosion left burnt out aerosol cans strewn across both carriageways of the motorway as the fire swiftly ripped through the lorry, leaving a charred skeleton of the vehicle behind.

The road was closed in both directions and the southbound carriage only reopened the following morning after Highways England repair teams had fixed the extensive damage to the road surface.

Essex Police officers worked to turn around cars already on the motorway as traffic piled up along the road.

Fire crews left the scene at 8.20pm, with the fire fully under control.

Station Manager Dave Bond said: "I would like to thank everyone involved in bringing this incident to a safe conclusion - and in particular our Control team who received dozens of calls with conflicting reports but still managed to get crews to the scene quickly.

“I must praise crews who worked extremely hard to establish a water supply in such a remote location and quickly get the incident under control."