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I'd heard rumours about this UK blow up a while ago but no one seemed to know anything about it but this has come to light now.

A salutary warning.

I don't know if anyone was hurt but I hope not.

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/showthread.php?t=106437

Jeeze...and his hand?

Always worth warning reloaders about paying attention and double checking.

There was an article on a blown-up M1896 in Guns Review magazine way back in the 80s showing identical damage to the rifle in the photos, In this case it was a double charge of Viht N110 behind a cast lead bullet, the case holding the 40 odd grains easily unlike a double charge of Viht N160 say behind a jacketed bullet. The moral is clear of course - look inside the case to check the charge level before seating the bullet especially in this sort of application.

I was also shown a comprehensively blown-up 7.62mm Carl Gustaf CG63E target rifle that used this action in Fultons at Bisley around 12 or 15 years ago, the result of a blow-up on the ranges in the early days of 7.62 Target Rifle. The owner clammed up after the incident and disappeared. All that was known was that it was a handload. Fultons sent sample rounds to the proof house with a warning, the latter apparently ignoring the letter as they telephoned Fultons and complained the round had 'destroyed their test barrel'. The assumption was that pistol or shotgun powder had been used.

In both such cases the damage was so comprehensive and the pressures obviously so far above allowed levels that no action would likely have survived, certainly not an M'98. Thanks to the design directing most of the escaping gas down through the magazine well, neither shooter was badly hurt - minor injuries to the left hand in both cases from the action sidewalls bulging and splitting the stock. It's interesting that the M98 type gas shield wasn't needed in these blow-ups, but I think its main benefit is when a primer blows, a very common failure in the early days of smokeless cartridges and one that cost Paul Mauser an eye when testing an experimental self-loading rifle.

A freind of mine had a swedish mauser blow up on him a couple years ago he was not hurt but he never got to the bottom of why it had blown.
Adam/Joe do you not remember the incident it was Bob N------.