Neil Tennant and Chris Lowe narrowly escaped death after meteor fragments came close to their plane during a flight.

The Pet Shop Boys stars were travelling to New Zealand for a gig when the pilot spotted burning debris just five miles from the jet, which equates to just 40 seconds of flight time. However, Tennant and Lowe slept through the incident and didn't find out about it until the next day.

"We were blissfully unaware of it," Tennant told The Sun. "We didn't know anything had happened until the next morning when the waitress at breakfast said, 'Are you glad to be alive?'

"Then we realised with horror what had happened. Our friends and families started calling us in a panic to find out if we were OK."

Captain Steven Anderson, from the International Pilots' Association, explained: "If a large piece of debris had hit the plane it would have been catastrophic."