At least three people have died after multiple buildings caught fire and collapsed in the wake of a gas explosion in a Sicilian town.

Six people were missing and two found alive under the rubble, according to Giuseppe Merendino, the captain of the fire service in Ravanusa, a commune in the south of the island.

A priest who was celebrating mass nearby on Saturday evening said the houses caught fire after a natural gas pipe exploded in the town of 11,000 people, in the province of Agrigento.

Four buildings were destroyed and another three were damaged, the Italian news agency Ansa quoted the director of the regional civil protection service as saying.

The explosion was perhaps triggered by an elevator and may have been amplified by a gas heater, the civil protection chief Salvatore Cocina said, adding that it was still too early to tell for certain.

Firefighters were still digging in the rubble for the missing on Sunday morning.

“It is a huge tragedy ... Let's pray to ask God to avoid more deaths,” said the priest, Filippo Barbera.

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