SS Moore narrowly escapes potential disaster

Retailer calls for vigilance amongst business owners –

One of Belfast’s longest running businesses, SS Moore’s, today narrowly escaped a fire in their city centre premises, causing thousands of pounds worth of smoke damage.

At 9.10am this morning (Wednesday), the Northern Ireland Fire and Rescue Service responded to a report of a fire at the business on Chichester Street, Belfast.

Jonathan Moore, director of the business commented: “We had ten staff in the store and a three customers, and the staff were going about their normal business.”

“Upon detection of smoke billowing from the electrics box, the alarm was raised.

“The building was quickly evacuated and the emergency services called. A call was also placed to Northern Ireland Electricity.

“The fire crew was on site within two to three minutes, by this time the whole of the ground floor was covered in black smoke. NIE were also on the scene very quickly and were able to cut the power supply from an external control.

“Thankfully the fire service had the situation quickly under control and it didn’t get a chance to fully ignite and spread and most importantly no one was inured. We have been told that if this had happened overnight – the situation would have been very different.”

“We are now facing thousands of pounds of smoke damaged stock.”

SS Moore’s has occupied the iconic city centre building for 40 of its 65-year history, and is the only independent sport’s retailer in Belfast.

Jonathan concluded: “I would like to thank the Northern Ireland Fire and Rescue Service for their rapid response and NIE for their immediate action and would encourage all businesses to have their electrical boxes checked by NIE to prevent incidents like this from happening in the future.”