Hundreds of students were evacuated yesterday when firefighters raced to put out a bin fire in one of Aberdeen University’s campus buildings.
Five fire crews were called to blaze inside the MacRobert building on the Old Aberdeen campus just after 10.30am.
Dozens of fire fighters rushed to the scene and used breathing apparatus to enter the second-floor room where a waste bin was alight.
The building houses the Business, Education and Music departments. Staff and students were evacuated from the building and waited for three hours whilst before being told they could return to fetch their belongings.
A group of students, who did not wish to be named, said they initially thought it was a fire drill and had left their belongings inside under the impression they would be “back in after five minutes”.
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The Scottish Fire and Rescue Service’s group manager Darren Riddell was at the scene and said the fire had been put out “fairly quickly”.
He added: “Due to the large amounts of smoke, four breathing apparatus units were used allowing firefighters to gain access to the second-floor room where a bin had caught fire.
“At this time the cause is still not known and we are carrying out our investigations. The building was fully evacuated.”
The first appliance arrived on the scene at 10.40am.
Four Aberdeen appliances were dispatched, two from North Anderson Drive and two from Central Fire Station and were joined by the incident control unit.
Breathing apparatus and fans to ventilate the area were deployed, while the personnel battled the fire.
According to a spokeswoman for the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service, the blaze was extinguished by 11.17am.
A university spokesman said the building had closed for the “remainder of the day” and added: “No one was hurt in the incident.
“Staff and students were given supervised access to the building to collect their belongings.
“The building will re-open at 8am on Saturday, with the exception of the affected room which is expected to be available for teaching as normal on Wednesday.”
