A spokesman for the Sriharikota space centre in the southern Indian state of Andhra Pradesh said that a senior space engineer was among the dead.

"Finally after more than six hours, rescue teams were able to enter the building," spokesman C. Ravindranath said. "Six bodies were taken out and all were men, including two labourers."

"The building is affected badly and it took time to get in," he said.

The space centre contains a satellite launch pad, a technical center for rocket testing and assembly, and a range of other facilities for launch control and satellite tracking.

Ravindranath said there were seven people inside when the fire broke out.

"The two labourers... (then) went in to help the engineers," he said.

Ravindranath said that firefighters had brought the blaze under control after battling it for two hours.

An official at the scene said the fire had triggered off an explosion that blew the roof of the building.

The chairman of Indian Space Research Organisation, Madhavan Nair, arrived in the southern Indian city of Madras late Monday from Bangalore, to supervise the rescue and clean-up operations.

Nair told reporters in Bangalore that the fire broke out as the propellant was being tested in the solid propellant space booster plant at the Satish Dhawan station.

"This seems to have happened while a propellent was being prepared for transportation. The propellant... caught fire and caused severe damage to the building in which the operations were going on," Nair said.

He added that the injured had been hospitalised with severe burns.

"This is a sad day in the history of the organisation," Nair said.

S.K. Das, ISRO spokesman, speaking in Bangalore said the station where the fire broke out had been cordoned off.

The centre began operations in 1971 for the launch of rockets involved in India's domestic space programme.

The area surrounding Sriharikota is a high-security zone and kept under constant watch by Indian police.

Ravindranath said the accident would not hinder launches or other space programmes slated for the current year. "There will be no impact and all the programmes will go on as scheduled," he said.

He said that a new Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle, jointly being developed with Russia, and a Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle, would be launched from the site this year as scheduled.

The space centre is used to launch India's launch vehicles' remote sensing and communication satellites.

It also houses the launch vehicle assembly and service facilities such as real time data processing and flight safety.

SPACE.WIRE