In a statement Engro said the explosion occurred at 5pm.

“Immediately the safety and emergency response teams were activated. At this point in time, our foremost priority remains the safety of our people and we remain focused on providing them with all necessary support.” the statement read.

Five people were injured in the incident; they are reported to be stable and being provided with necessary medical aid, the company said.

In the statement, Engro said that initial reports showed that the explosion occurred in the conveyor belt systems which feed the coal into the power plant.

The power plant was under scheduled outage where one of the units was already shut down for maintenance whereas the other was operational.

For safety reasons the company has shut down the operational unit whilst investigations into the incident are underway, the statement further read.