Massive blaze at garage

Eric Baxter • Published 17 May 2010 14:00

FIRE destroyed a former motor repair garage in Port Glasgow - and the blaze is being treated as suspicious.

A gas main was ruptured by the blaze, which broke out around 11.45pm on Friday at empty Ardgowan Street premises formerly occupied by the John McGhee garage, which moved three weeks ago to MacDougall Street in Greenock.

It is not known yet what caused the fire.

Strathclyde Fire and Rescue group commander Richie Duncan said: "Investigations are continuing, but we are treating the fire as suspicious."

The premises consist of a garage workshop and an office building, which is believed to be listed.

Mr Duncan said: "This was a serious fire. It was fully developed when we arrived. The workshop was completely destroyed and the firefighters did very well to stop it spreading to the office building.

"The roof of the workshop collapsed and the gable end was in danger of falling down.

"We had a total of 45 firefighters there from Port Glasgow and Greenock. There were five fire engines, a forward control unit, plus a support pump and three senior officers attending the incident."

Mr Duncan added: "We were engaged in external firefighting all night because of the dangerous condition of the building.

"There is asbestos in the roof span, so we had to take extra precautions."

The fire was brought under control at 2.20am, but firefighters stayed at the scene throughout Saturday because of pockets of fire caused by the burning gas main.

The premises were formerly used for car body repairs and maintaining and repairing vehicles.

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