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Police suspect fire in Swedish city was 'coordinated arson'

TT/The Local
TT/The Local - [email protected]
Police suspect fire in Swedish city was 'coordinated arson'
One of the arson sites in Trollhättan. Photo: Joachim Nywall/TT

Multiple fires broke out in Trollhätten, north of Gothenburg, on Thursday night. A multi-storey car park, an abandoned terraced house and almost 20 cars were set alight.

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Police suspect that the fires were started as part of a coordinated action, but no one has been arrested and there are no suspects.

“The alarm was raised at 10.30pm and the fires were slightly spread out, but quite close to each other, which makes us think it could be a coordinated action, but we don’t want to speculate on what has happened,” Göran Carlbom, officer for the western police region told TT newswire.

Despite the severity of the fires, no one has been injured.

"We have not received information of any injuries," police spokesperson Hans-Jörgen Ostler told TT. "But there is large material damage".

“The terraced house turned out to be a building scheduled for demolition, so rescue services let that burn down, but some apartments near the multi-storey car park have been evacuated due to smoke,” Carlbom told TT.

A VMA or "important message to the public" was issued, telling residents of Trollhättan to stay indoors and close doors, windows and ventilation.

By 1am on Friday, the fires had almost completely been extinguished, but shortly afterwards police received reports of three cars which had been set alight in a residential area.

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“We don’t know if [the fires] are related, it’s too early to say,” Carlbom told TT.

The areas in question will be closed off for technical investigations, and fire services were still on the scene at 1am.

“There’s no risk of the fire spreading, but we’re still here to ensure everything remains safe,” Mona Hedhman, on-duty officer at the Trollhätten fire service told TT.

Witnesses have reported sightings of three young individuals wearing masks running from one of the car fires, although no arrests have been made.

"We're working on a fairly extensive operation," Ostler told TT, "but we're being a bit secretive on what we're working on, so we don't tip any possible perpetrators off to the fact that we're on their trail."

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