Hundreds of cars burnt out after Sharjah fire

Staff return to site of blaze to see if anything is worth salvaging after area is cooled enough to allow investigations into how fire started.

Hundreds of vehicles and spare parts worth millions of dirhams were destroyed in a fire that gutted three second-hand car warehouses on Monday. Jaime Puebla / The National

SHARJAH // Hundreds of vehicles and spare parts worth millions of dirhams were destroyed in the fire that gutted three second-hand car warehouses on Monday.

Yesterday staff returned to the scene of the blaze in the Sharjah industrial area to see for themselves what remains of their workplaces and what, if anything, could be salvaged.

Firefighters from Dubai, Ajman and Umm Al Quwain joined crews from Sharjah Civil Defence who struggled for hours in a bid to control the fire. The blaze spread from a warehouse belonging to Al Zaeem Al Sham second-hand cars and spare parts warehouse to two buildings owned by the Bab Al Hara and the Al Najma Al Safra used car and spare parts companies. A nearby furniture store was also destroyed.

Ehsan Raza Saleem, a sales employee at Al Najma Al Safra, said it would take months to sort through the damage.

“We lost more than 150 used cars, and if you add the cars lost in the whole blaze in all the warehouses it could be more than 400 vehicles.

“There were several scrapped cars packed on top of each other and this is why the loss was so much.”

The warehouses were also being used to store spare parts worth millions of dirhams, added Mr Saleem.

He said this was the second time the company had been devastated by a fire. In 2005 a used car showroom used by Al Najma Al Safra was gutted, destroying dozens of vehicles.

Mr Saleem said his boss lost everything in the first fire and had to build up a new business from scratch. He wasn’t sure if his employer, who has health problems, would be able to rebuild once again.

“The news has been so much that my boss can’t even come to see the wreckage,” said Mr Saleem. “He has high blood pressure and doctors have advised him to relax and stay at home.”

A spokesman from Sharjah Civil Defence said the area had been cooled, and Sharjah CID had been given the all-clear to start their investigations.

Mr Saleem believed an electric fault started the fire, as some members of staff said they had seen sparks before the building was evacuated.

Mohammed Shuaib, foreman at the Al Zaeem Al Sham used cars and spare parts warehouse, said the blaze could have started in a workshop.

He said as soon as people spotted the smoke and flames, his supervisor ordered staff to start moving some of the company’s cars to a safe distance.

“We started with the big expensive four-wheel drives, but soon the wind was blowing fire to our side and the civil defence told us to stop and leave the place,” he said.

“We managed to save about a dozen cars before we left.”

Staff from the three warehouses and the furniture store were able to leave their workplaces safely and no injury or death was reported.