Police said Saturday that a fire that gutted some 220 street stalls of a traditional fish market in the western port city of Incheon started from a stall in a vinyl-wrapped makeshift building.


The fire broke out at 1:36 a.m. and was put out two and a half hours later. Some 140 firefighters, 53 fire engines and 40 police officers were mobilized, police said.

No injuries or fatalities have been reported yet. Police put property damage at around 650 million won ($574,712).

Investigators found through their analysis of CCTV footage that smoke first began to emerge from a stall in the building with no sprinklers, before the blaze spread across the market and damaged two-thirds of the stores. 

A police scientific investigation team and forensic experts were sent to the scene. They were looking into an electricity transformer that merchants cited as a possible cause, officials said. (Yonhap)