Sometimes it happens, that oil in a pan remains on the hotplate without the care of the cook (who is phoning for example). After a while the oil gets so hot, that it ignites by itself.
If the cook comes back and tries to extinguish the flames with water, we get an explosion of the hot oil: The water vaporizes immediately, the oil is sprayed and a huge jet of flame is created. The voluntary fire brigade of Batzenhofen showed this process on their open day on 06/16/2002.