Adelaide Hills shops destroyed in suspected arson incident

ABC NEWS (Australia)

The Adelaide Hills Council is investigating temporary options for businesses affected by a major fire that destroyed a supermarket in the Adelaide Hills town of Stirling. Two boys have been arrested with emergency services still investigating the blaze which caused at least $25 million worth of damage.

Transcript

00:00 A supermarket, nearby shops and livelihoods all destroyed in one afternoon.

00:07 It's been our blood, sweat and a lot of tears.

00:10 Yeah, I've watched the trees grow on the freeway for 20 years driving up here.

00:14 The fire is believed to have started in the aerosol aisle of Woolworths Stirling on Sunday.

00:19 The moment the fire alarms went off I looked to my right and it's just a huge column of flames going up.

00:24 Places like this, they're full of lots of materials that unfortunately are quite flammable

00:28 and so a combination of that fuel load meant that there was everything the fire needed to rapidly escalate.

00:34 Some business owners have still not been inside to assess the full damage.

00:38 Until we find out those answers we really don't know where we stand right now.

00:43 The council is already offering a temporary solution of pop-up stores.

00:47 There's a number of places around Stirling where we could do that,

00:51 we could utilise them, we could put two or three there and we can make it look a bit attractive.

00:55 We're going to be calling on Woolworths to be ensuring that everyone is receiving pay during this week

01:02 and that reallocations will be arranged for workers where they can be.

01:06 And that'll be a devastating blow for the Hills town.

01:09 It's just quite heartbreaking honestly, it was a really lovely place to work

01:13 and obviously a big part of the community fixed here at Stirling.

01:17 Two 14-year-old boys have been charged with arson and will appear in court in December.

01:22 [BLANK_AUDIO]

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