Fuel hose soaks motorist

A woman who was soaked with petrol from a split service station hose is furious that staff allowed her to drive home afterwards despite the fire risk.

Ingrid Carson of Paraparaumu was trying to fill her lawnmower container with $10 of petrol on Tuesday when fuel came spraying out of the hose at the Z station on Kapiti Rd, soaking her hair and clothes.

“Petrol poured all over my . . . hair, all down my clothes [so I was] completely doused in petrol,” Carson said.

She discovered there was a split higher up the petrol hose.

Staff gave her serviettes to dry off with and a free coffee and a muffin, and plastic sheets to cover her car seat with. A staff member filled her lawnmower container and put it in her car. As Carson sat back in her car, the staff member reminded her she owed $10, before jokingly saying they would not charge her for the $10 of petrol on her clothes and the forecourt.

Carson then drove home and tried to wash the petrol out of her hair with a hose on the lawn.

While she was on the phone to someone from Z to question whether it was standard practice to “give me a coffee and a muffin and send me on my merry way”, the fire brigade showed up and told her to get into the shower.

At that point, Carson had already “burst into tears” on the phone to Z.

Then an ambulance also showed up at Carson’s home so paramedics could check her blood pressure and make sure she was feeling okay.

Meanwhile, Carson’s son posted a complaint on the Z Facebook page.

One firefighter told her if the brigade had been called they would have set up a portable shower to wash her off.

She said the owner of Z had apologised to her.

Z spokesman Jonathan Hill said there would be a full investigation into the incident, but it appeared the hose had become damaged when the customer before Carson tried to drive away with the hose still attached to their car.

“We will share the outcome of the review with her and we’ll make damn sure to learn from it.”