Fire at Birmingham shop sounded ‘like a bomb went off’ – local resident
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A fire that broke out at the front of a shop in Birmingham sounded “like a bomb went off”, a local resident said. Local property developer Isaac Zintaan said he was alerted to the fire in the early hours of Monday at Stratford Road, Sparkhill, by residents of his nearby premises after they told him they heard a “loud explosion”.
Mr Zintaan said he thought the fire was caused by a car which was set alight and rammed into a supermarket. “I have a business close by… the residents of my premises heard a loud explosion – ‘like a bomb went off’ that’s what they described,” the 28-year-old from Sparkhill told the PA news agency.
“(When I arrived) everyone was coughing due to the intensity of the smoke.”. Mr Zintaan said it appeared a car had rammed the supermarket on the ground floor of the building and footage taken by him showed a Land Rover on fire with its rear to the property – as if having reversed into it.
A 4×4 was pictured on Monday morning being extracted from the shop by a fire truck. The car appeared charred and warped by the fire, with bay windows above the shop burnt out. West Midlands Fire Service said it responded to the incident at Stratford Road, Sparkhill, shortly before 4.55am on Monday.
The fire service said the blaze at the front of a retail store spread to shop signage and the bay windows of flats above. In an update on Monday morning, it said the fire was “under control” and there were no casualties or injuries after five people received checks from paramedics after leaving their properties.
