One of Oxford University's largest collection of books narrowly escaped damage when a water pipe burst.

Staff at The Queen's College, in High Street, had to treat the precious 17th and 18th century books with blotting paper to save them. Machines were used to dry out the area.

The flood happened when workers installing en-suite bathrooms into the student bedrooms burst one of the hot water pipes in the ceiling, sending water cascading six feet to the basement floor.

Onlookers said the water came down in sheets and filled the underground room to about four inches.

The leak was not plugged for several hours but luckily staff were on the scene within minutes and managed to save rare books. Librarian Jonathan Bengtson said: "It could have been much worse than it was. If it had happened at the weekend or in another part of the library, more books would have been damaged.

"As it is, only a few hundred were affected and we won't have to replace anything. Even though the books are quite old, they are fairly robust.

"We are hoping things will be back to normal in the next week or so."

Story date: Tuesday 23 February

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