A blaze on one of Sidmouth’s new buses delayed a councillor’s trip home from Exeter on Saturday.

Jack Brokenshire was heading back from the city on the 52 route but found the depot closed to deal with the emergency.

“They were keeping the public away and there was a fire engine there,” said the ward member for Sidford.

“We didn’t know what was going on but someone said it might explode – you wouldn’t have thought there would be much of a fire hazard from diesel.”

There had been a small fire in the engine compartment of one of the double deckers.

Passengers were taken off the bus and the station was cleared for around 40 minutes.

A spokesman for bus operator Stagecoach said: “There were delays to some services during the incident and we would like to apologise to passengers for the disruption.

“Safety is our absolute priority and an investigation is underway into the cause of the fire.”

Councillor Brokenshire made it home safely.