ParmaToday
Several hours of work to put out the flames that completely devoured the buildings in via Emilio Lepido. The big fire it broke out around 4 pm, starting from a Chinese shop and quickly spreading to the adjacent complex, where there was a children’s goods store of which there is now nothing left. The flames enveloped everything, eight teams of firefighters were needed to put them out, working all afternoon while the thick black smoke spread throughout the area west of the city. No people are involved. But the damages, huge, would amount to several thousand euros.
“We started hearing noises, we thought it was an earthquake – reports a saleswoman at work in the children’s goods store -. As soon as I left, I saw the cloud of black smoke rising rapidly and the fire alarm went off. We opened the doors and we invited customers and sales staff out. Thank goodness none of us were injured. The shop next to ours was already engulfed in flames. When we went to recover the machines we began to hear explosions: the flames were very high and quickly surrounded the buildings until they were devoured. Inside there is nothing left, the back is completely destroyed. You can only see the roof that has come down. The back is gone. In the container there was flammable goods : cardboard, plastic, wooden material. Everything burned in an instant. The firefighters recovered, on our instructions, our personal belongings. They were good. Nothing was left inside. We were told that the fire probably started because someone was trying out pyrotechnics and handling lighters.”
Meanwhile, the carabinieri are at work to clarify the dynamics. In addition to the police, Arpae technicians were also on site, working with civil protection personnel to understand the extent of the smoke release. For now there is no environmental damage, but it will be important to understand in the next few hours what effect the material that has been on fire for hours will have. Five people present were mildly intoxicated. They turned to the ambulance that was on site to possibly help someone. They didn’t need medical attention. Traffic was blocked for hours with various inconveniences to the viability in via Emilio Lepido and the southern ring road.