• Events The Firefighters control the fire in the Mercamadrid fruit warehouse and save half of the stalls from the fire

The Mercamadrid fire, declared late yesterday afternoon, has not yet come to an end and

has already devoured more than 5,000 square meters of Warehouse A of the fruit market and destroyed the stalls of 11 companies

.

A director of Firefighters Madrid, Fernando Munilla, explained that the fire is in "control phase" with "the progression stopped since last night", but that there are still "hot spots" that will remain "perhaps all day" from today.

In fact, the firefighters themselves have not yet managed to access the interior due to the heat accumulated with the sheets that make up the structure, which came to be "given up for lost", and continue their work from outside the ship.

Only the emergency services accessed the interior at a specific moment in the cafeteria area, where they managed to stop its spread, according to the person in charge of the body.

"Of 6,000 square meters, more than half is seriously affected, especially in the left area. Once the fire catches, it spreads at high speed," Munilla detailed,

describing it as "impossible" to know at the moment by why the fire occurred in Mercamadrid,

a job that will correspond to the Police.

But first the firefighters, who have had 27 crews and up to 85 people working simultaneously on the extinction, will have to extinguish it completely.

Despite the "spectacular" nature of the fire, the general director of the joint venture, David Chica, has revealed that "about 5,000 or 5,500 square meters" of the 75,000 square meters intended

for the marketing of fruit and vegetables

have been affected .

"Today is a sad day, but on Tuesday Mercamadrid will work as normally as possible, except for Warehouse A," said the person in charge.

The intention of the Mercamadrid management is that the 11 affected companies, which total around 60 positions in that area,

can have "a temporary location" on Tuesday to continue carrying out their work

and that they "can resume activity in their facilities as soon as possible ".

For this, the company itself will be the one to analyze the insurance policies together with those affected.

"Mercamadrid is not going to let them down, it is key that they can return to work as soon as possible", said the general manager.

What Mercamadrid has not yet managed to establish is the exact damage caused by the fire in the facilities and in the material of these companies.

"We have been in communication with them as soon as we can order the day after

. The estimate of damage is still difficult to do because we do not know how the structure is or what is salvageable

, "said Chica, who added that "the month July is a less active month and the overall volume is lower than other times of the year."

The fire started yesterday around 7:15 p.m.

in warehouse A of the central fruit and vegetable market,

causing a large column of black smoke visible from the entire region.

Upon arrival at the scene, the Firefighters found the fire already well advanced and the flames had broken through the roof, advancing through the upper area of ​​the offices.

Despite the fact that the situation was complicated, the emergency services managed to stop the spread of the fire around midnight and control it from the intermediate zone of the ship.

located in the cafeteria.

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