A TANDOORI takeaway collapsed into the street today 24 hours after the owner began building work in the cellar.

Dozens of houses in the Whalley Range area of Blackburn were left without gas and electricity after the property began to give way in the early hours.

Wesley Street was cordoned off by police and firefighters after the gable-end of the Tandoori Oven shop started to fall down.

And a council boss said the cost of the operation to save the building could run into thousands of pounds.

The side of the takeaway building started showing huge cracks at lunchtime yesterday.

Crowds gathered to watch as firefighters and council workers battled to save the building as it teetered on the edge of collapse.

Yesterday, owner Shaukat Ali, who also owns a house next door but one to the takeaway, said builders had been carrying out work in the cellar of the property and the foundations had moved.

"We tried to prop it up to make it safe, but it is going to cost me a lot of money to put right," he said.

But today, as the building began to collapse and furniture began sliding into the street, he refused to comment.

Blackburn with Darwen Council's director of technical services, Alan Peake, said buildings on either side of the property had to be scaffolded early today after the collapse. And between 30 and 40 homes in the area were left without gas and electricity after supplies were cut off as a safety measure.

"It seems the owner of the building was working in the cellar and it became unsafe. Council workers have been on the scene all morning working with the emergency services to secure the area after the building collapsed.

"Our first objective is to make everything safe, then we will be talking to the owner of the property about the cost of this whole operation.," he said.

It is the second time property in the street has suffered major damage.

In 1997, a family of four had to be evacuated from their home next to the Tandoori Oven after a chimney breast wall started to collapse.

Zeban Hussain lived with her husband Munsaf and three children aged 10, eight and four in the house next to the takeaway but had to move to another house in Whalley Range two years ago after the previous structure problems in the area.

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