A Kent MP appeared on national television to speak about the moment he was engulfed by flames - urging people to stay safe this bonfire night.

Sittingbourne and Sheppey representative Gordon Henderson was left with 30 per cent burns to his body when his bonfire exploded at his home in Eastchurch back in August.

The 69-year-old spent 10 days in East Grinstead’s specialist Queen Victoria Hospital.

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In his interview on Good Morning Britain today, Gordon said he was lucky to have come away from the incident with his life.

He said: “I am lucky that I had available, by my bonfire, a hosepipe and my wife managed to hose me down.

“I did what I had been doing for ages, which is to try and light a bonfire in my garden using a little bit of petrol. That was stupid.

“What I hadn’t taken into account was the temperature of the day and the fact that petrol fumes had built up, so when I went to light the fire it wasn’t the petrol that took it was the fumes and it just blew up.

“It exploded on me and caught my hair alight and my shorts. It really was horrific.”

Gordon said he was in “tremendous pain” throughout the ordeal, but he was lucky not to have been in the mortuary.

He also thanked the Kent Air Ambulance for their help in getting him to Tunbridge Wells Hospital in Pembury in around 15 minutes.

“If that hadn’t have happened I would have been in an even worse condition than I was,” he said.

Gordon told presenters Ranvir Singh and Ben Shephard that he still wakes in the night because of what happened.

He said: “I wake up in the night sometimes remembering that explosion and of course there is nothing you can do.

“And the reason I have come on today, what with bonfire night approaching, is that I just want to get that message out.”

“Do not be tempted at all to use petrol on your fire tonight, tomorrow or on Sunday – use ordinary fire lighters, they’re much much safer.”

“Be warned people,” he added.

Fire services are called to 50 per cent more emergencies around November 5.

More than 4,000 patients went to A&E with a firework injury in 2014-2015.