Stansted Airport Fire Destroys 24 Cars

A fire broke out at Stansted Airport, destroying 24 vehicles belonging to holidaymakers abroad. Firefighters were called to the car park’s Zone C in the long-stay area just before 2:30am Sunday morning.

CCTV footage was showing a car alight, and a staff member spotted the blaze. However, the flames took over a whole row of cars within just minutes. The fire crews had to call more firefighters for help and fought to keep the petrol tanks of the vehicles from exploding. There were 25 firemen and the airport’s own fire team, who battled for an hour to get the fire under control.

It’s thought that the blaze was caused by an electrical fault on one of the cars, and the flames spread fast because of the high winds of up to 80kph. It’s estimated that the damage will cost £250,000 to fix, and it may be hard to make insurance claims, as it may be impossible to identify which car sparked the incident. However, this could have been much worse. The car park has a capacity of 26,500 cars and was nearly full during the school holiday season.

An Essex airport spokesperson said that the owners will have an unpleasant surprise when they return to find their cars wrecked by the fire. However, they are arranging for free taxis to take them home or for them to get a 40% off discount with a car hire company. An investigation by police and fire services is being conducted, while the Zone C area of the car park is closed off to new arrivals for now.