Andrew Dale, founder of The G Spot Canberra food truck, has been hospitalised with burns to his face and body following an explosion in another of his food trucks stationed on the South Coast.
Mr Dale was flown to the burns unit at Concord Hospital in Sydney after an explosion in his food truck, The Lost Thong at Batemans Bay, on Sunday, at 11.25am before he had opened it to the public.
Speaking to The Canberra Times after being discharged from hospital, a still stunned Mr Dale said he couldn't believe he was alive, with burns to his face, arm and ear.
"I've had no skin grafts, I've had no operations. Forty-eight hours after it happened, I'm getting out of hospital," he said.
"I walked away from it [the explosion] and I had no right to."
Mr Dale believes his saving grace was that he opened the front counter flap of the food truck "about a foot" as he prepared to start business for the day, something "I never, ever usually do".
"That must have let some of the air out because it it wasn't open, I'd be a 1000-piece jigsaw puzzle by now," he said.
He said a sauce bottle on the counter catapulted 10 to 15 metres in the explosion which people have told him they felt from 400 metres away.
Mr Dale said another lucky thing was customers were not waiting for the truck to open at the front of the counter, as they normally do, but to the side, a change he simply couldn't explain, as the explosion erupted near the Catalina Golf and Country Club.
He had no idea what caused the explosion.
"I was so lucky I was leaning on the front counter writing up a menu board when it went bang," he wrote on Facebook.
"There was an explosion that I thought deafened me in my right ear, but hasn't.
"I can't believe that I walked out of it. No cuts, no blood but a number of burns and a fair bit of singed hair, unfortunately not the hair on my back.
"Flames went to the roof then rolled down the front wall and that's how I got a burnt face."
A GoFundMe page has been set up to help Mr Dale, who has said he has now "officially retired" from food trucks, and who has a history of helping those in need in the community, from bushfire victims to families isolated by COVID lockdowns.
"I'm grateful that I got to walk away today. I can't figure out how I had so much luck," he wrote on his Facebook page.
A spokesman for NSW Fire and Rescue said regarding the explosion, "an area of interest is a leakage of LPG that was ignited by an unknown source".
The general message from Fire and Rescue was: "When not in use always turn off your portable LPG cylinders. Always make sure connecting hoses are in good order and seal correctly. You can check a seal by apply a solution of soapy water around connectors and check for bubbles".
The organiser of the GoFundMe page, Jessie Zivkovic, said Mr Dale's family were with him and guiding him through his recovery.
The fundraiser was to extend a helping hand to Mr Dale who had helped many other people over the years.
"Anyone that knows Andrew knows the type of man he is," the GoFundMe page read.
"Andrew is the founder of The G Spot food van in Canberra bringing amazing late night food to 1000s of people from all over.
"Andrew rallied behind the devastating 2019-2020 NSW fires and bought hope, peace, joy, food, clothes, courage and so much more to people that lost everything but the clothes on their backs.
"He rallied behind the NSW floods.
"This is just a little bit of what Andrew has done for people.
"He just continues to help lend a hand where ever he can no matter how great or small."
Mr Dale said his daughter now ran The G Spot food truck while he had moved to the South Coast and purchased The Lost Thong truck for his mental health.
He said he was now ready to "work for someone else".
And he would not accept any suggestion his good works in the past might have helped him escape the explosion with his life. He never expected any payback.
"I do what I do because I love it," he said.
"[Helping other people] is nutrition for my body. It gives me energy."
Donations to the fundraiser can be made here.
