Firemen at the scene.
MIRI: A father of three got the shock of his life when he saw his car parked at the basement of a shopping mall along Jalan Merpati here on fire on Saturday night.
The incident reportedly occurred around 9pm.
According to him, prior to the incident, his wife and their children had gone inside the shopping mall to buy some groceries.
“As there was no more parking space at the upper basement, we went to the second floor basement to park our car, it was around 8pm,” said the owner, who wished to remain anonymous when met by The Borneo Post.
A fire engine from Lopeng was immediately mobilised to the scene upon receiving a distress call made by the mall’s security.
Fortunately, swift action by the firemen and security guards of the mall prevented the fire from spreading.
They managed to put out the fire several minutes later.
Preliminary investigation revealed that the fire had started from the engine.
However, the actual cause of the incident has yet to be determined as Bomba was still investigating.
Several vehicles parked side by side with the car were immediately removed by their owners as they feared the fire might spread to their vehicles.
Plumes of smokes were also seen clouding the parking area for several minutes due to the fire.
In an unrelated incident, a car was reported stolen from a parking space of a shopping complex in the city centre on Saturday morning.
A police report on the incident has been lodged by the car’s owner at the central police station.
Police are investigating the case.
The car was parked at the mall’s parking space around 9am, and when the owner came back around 10.30am, it was nowhere to be seen.