Fire was reported in an old concrete building on Grettisgata 27 in central Reykjavík yesterday and every available fire fighter was called to the scene. No one was harmed in the fire, but the house, which had been scheduled for demolition, was destroyed.
All streets near the building were temporarily closed to make it easier for fire fighters to extinguish the fire. Smoke divers went into the house to make sure there was no one inside, Fréttabladid reports.
“We were concerned that someone was inside the house, because homeless people are known to seek shelter there,” said Gudmundur Halldórsson, the senior fire fighter on duty at the capital region fire department.
Shortly after the smoke divers left the building, the roof collapsed.
“The flames reached three or four meters out of the roof so we were worried about the neighboring buildings. But fortunately the fire did not breach the house’s firewalls and we were successful in extinguishing the fire,” Halldórsson said.
“It has become standard practice to summon every available fire fighter to the scene when there’s a fire in this neighborhood because there are a lot of timber houses here, which creates a very dangerous situation,” Halldórsson explained.
