WEST Australian police commissioner Karl O'Callaghan's 29-year-old son has been badly burned in an illegal drug lab explosion in Perth.

Torn between his roles as police commissioner and a dad, Mr O'Callaghan has told of his struggle to be good at both after revealing the incident. "There's always that conflict between being the commissioner of police and being the father," an emotional Mr O'Callaghan told The Australian last night after visiting his son, Russell, in Royal Perth Hospital.

The younger O'Callaghan was one of five people hurt in the powerful blast, which tore a hole through the roof of a Carlisle state housing unit. One man was in critical condition. Two toddlers escaped unhurt.

"I was quite shocked by the sight of him," Mr O'Callaghan said. "He's got serious burns to his head, neck, shoulders arms and torso. So he's pretty much bandaged right up to his head."



But he said his son was lucid and the first thing he asked was how were the two children who were nearby. "He described the explosion as a fireball that just engulfed all of them. He has been really shaken by this. He said he came within a hair's breadth of losing his life and he's exactly right.

"You can talk about clan labs all you like as a police officer. But when you get to talk to someone whose been involved in something like that and that person's very close to you, then it really drives home what the issue is."

Mr O'Callaghan reassured his estranged son, who has previously been treated for drug addiction, that he would not abandon him, saying the most important thing was that he got "well both mentally and physically".

Mr O'Callaghan said 30 illegal drug labs had been broken up in the state this year and 130 last year. Most of the backyard operations appeared to be making methamphetamines.

Coincidentally, the daughter of former police superintendent Dave Parkinson was living in the unit next door to the clandestine drug-making operation, with both of them complaining more than 40 times to the Department of Housing and police about the noise, domestic violence, alcohol abuse, insults and even alleged physical attacks on both of them.

Mr Parkinson claims the tenant had once told his daughter, Stacee, they had a .22 rifle and were going to shoot her father for standing up to them. But, despite the department's "three strikes " policy against anti-social behaviour, the tenants were never evicted. Ms Parkinson said she lived in continual fear of her neighbours around the illegal drug lab.

"It's been absolutely hell," she said. "It's been absolutely devastating, horrible. I have a look around to see if there's anyone there before I step foot into my home. That's how bad it is."