A 5-year-old boy is dead after a hyperbaric chamber explosion at a medical center in Michigan.

Police and firefighters responded to The Oxford Medical Center in Troy shortly before 8 a.m. Friday for a report of a hyperbaric chamber explosion with a child inside the chamber, according to the Troy Fire Department. When first responders arrived, they found the child deceased inside the chamber.

“A hyperbaric chamber contains 100 percent oxygen, which is up to three times the amount of oxygen than a normal room,” officials said. “The presence of such a high amount of oxygen in a pressurized environment can make it extremely combustible.”

The Mayo Clinic describes the chamber as therapy that increases the delivery of oxygen to a person’s body providing pure oxygen in an enclosed space with higher than normal air pressure.

The therapy can be used to treat decompression sickness, serious tissue disease or wounds, trapped air bubbles in blood vessels, carbon monoxide poisoning and tissue damage from radiation therapy.

The fire department said this type of incident is not common and the scene remains under an active investigation.

“The mother of the child suffered some injuries to her arms as she was standing right next to the chamber as the explosion occurred,” Troy police Lt. Ben Hancock said during a news conference. “We don’t know exactly what the child was being treated for at the center today.”

Troy Fire Lt. Keith Young added the explosion was contained to the chamber and a fire in the room had to be put out.

“The safety and wellbeing of the children we serve is our highest priority,” the center said in an email to CBS News. “Nothing like this has happened in our more than 15 years of providing this type of therapy. We do not know why or how this happened and will participate in all of the investigations that now need to take place.”

Social workers from the Oakland Community Health Network are working with emergency responders and medical staff who responded to the scene.

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