A Bathurst family narrowly escaped injury when their newly purchased microwave oven malfunctioned, spraying shards of glass.
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Mitchell Pritchard bought the $99 microwave oven from discount supermarket chain Aldi just days before the incident.
The disability support worker told Yahoo 7 he was at home with his partner and young daughter when they decided to microwave popcorn.
"I put the popcorn in and picked up my daughter because she wanted to have a look," Mr Pritchard, 24, said.
"With about 10 seconds to go, I put her down and just before the timer ended there was this huge bang, so I leaned forward to see what had happened.
"The door busted open and hit me on the forehead.
"The plate had shattered, and the turntable had shattered as well."
He said he had used the microwave once before and it worked fine so he was stunned when the appliance malfunctioned.
"There was glass everywhere," he said.
"The explosion sounded like a gunshot; my daughter was screaming her head off and I had to calm her down.
"I had to pick her up again because there was glass everywhere - on the floor, all through the kitchen."
The family returned the damaged microwave to Aldi the next day and their money was refunded.
"They were really good about it, but it's still worrying," he said.
"Someone could have been really seriously hurt."
An Aldi spokeswoman said staff were "understandably concerned" when the microwave was returned.
She said the claims regarding the 20L microwave which was sold as a "special buy" on August 9, have been investigated.
"We can confirm that this is an isolated incident and we will not be recalling the product," she said.
"All customers that have purchased the product can be confident to continue use."
