A 45-year-old Oxford man was arrested yesterday after a silver BMW burst into flames closing Gloucester Green underground car park on Wednesday night.
Oxfordshire Fire and Rescue Service sent six fire engines and four support vehicles from Kidlington, Eynsham, Rewley Road, Slade Park and Wheatley fire stations after being called to reports of the fire at 7.41pm.
Firefighters were on the scene within minutes and discovered the car park engulfed in dense smoke.
The car park’s automatic water sprinklers also helped suppress the fire to prevent it from spreading to other cars.
Crews fully extinguished the fire using high pressure hose reel jets, before four large portable fans were used to clear the car park of smoke and fire gases.
Firefighters were at the scene until just before 11pm dealing with the incident.
Incident commander station manager Gary D’Anger said: “Fires in basements always present firefighting crews with an array of problems and can particularly difficult to deal with.
“Once crews are in the basement area conditions can be very difficult, hot and vision completely obscured due to the smoke and limited ventilation.
“The sprinkler system was extremely effective in containing the fire to a relatively small area.”
The man arrested is in police custody.
