900 firefighters quenching Barakholka in Almaty
A large fire has happened in Almaty flea market located in the lower outskirts of the city. The market, also known as Barakholka, started burning late on February 4 after all the doors were closed and all the traders and customers were long gone. Firefighters got the message about the fire at 9:09 p.m. and arrived to the site 9 minutes later.
The flames initially engulfed 400 square meters of the flea market section called Jupiter packed with a variety of consumer goods and then tried to spill into the neighboring Alatau-1 section, but were thrown back by the firefighters. However the fire was so large that they could not take it under control right away and it eventually covered the area somewhere between 1000 and 1500 square meters. The damages are still being estimated.
914 firefighters were working hard to extinguish the huge fire along with 111 fire-fighting vehicles. Their deliberation and numbers helped them stop the flames from spreading any further by 10:17 and extinguish the fire completely by midnight.
