Two buildings in the center of the Hemsedal mountains caught fire. The fire brigade struggled for a long time to gain control, but as late as Thursday night they reported that the danger was over

It started to catch fire in a building at a ski resort in Hemsedal around 4pm on Wednesday.

It caught fire in an apartment building under construction. The fire spread to the neighboring building, which is also an apartment building.

There was extensive damage to both complexes. The blackout work took a long time.

– There is no reason to believe that it will spread any further now, operations manager Arild Alfheim in the Southeast police district told VG just before 10pm.

At around 00:10, the police reported to NTB that the fire was under control.

– The firefighters have controlled the fire, but will probably continue to extinguish it until morning, said operations manager Tore Grindem at the Southeast Polsek to NTB a little after midnight.

Task manager Martin Slevigen at exchange 110 South-East confirmed that there was no longer any danger of spread and that they had stopped the fire from moving out.

A demanding firefighter job

Everyone in the neighboring building has been recorded, and it has also not been reported that anyone who worked in the building during construction is missing, said operations manager Alfheim.

It’s a huge building material and a time-consuming job, says Alfheim. Previously, exchange 110 stated that they were demanding firefighting work.

– There is a lot of energy burning, and it is difficult to control. The work was mostly done with external blackouts, Slevigen said at 7:45 p.m. on Wednesday night.

In addition, strong winds also make the work of firefighters more difficult.

Strong fire

There are many crews in turn. A total of 13 vehicles from the fire service contributed on the spot, according to 110 exchanges.

The fire service received assistance from the fire services in Lærdal and rdal.

Residents around the location were asked to close their windows because there was smoke from the scene.

Traffic was directed to the site to prevent more people from entering the area where the fire was, police said.

Video from the site shows a strong fire and lots of black smoke rising from the building, which is located in a ski lift area in the center of the mountains in Hemsedal.

Marketing director Ida Thue Stokstad at Solon Eiendom confirmed that one of their buildings under construction in the Fjellandsbyen Hemsedal project was affected.

– We don’t know anything else and can’t comment on causes, consequences or anything else, said Stokstad.

Residents in the area were asked to close windows as there was smoke coming from the premises, the police wrote in the update.

Has set crisis staff

The evacuation was handled by the city government. The mayor of Hemsedal, Pål Terje Rørby, confirmed to VG that the city government has assigned a crisis staff.

– We have put together crisis management to get an overview of the situation, both in terms of which institutions are in place, developments and risk of spread, said Rørby.

He said that great resources were available to keep spectators at a safe distance, as well as secure nearby buildings.

– Do you know about the damage level?

– So far, we have not received any reports of personal injury, only material injuries. But we are following the situation closely, because there is still a danger of it spreading.

– Is it known how the fire started?

– No, but there must be construction workers in one building, so we’re assuming that the fire started in that building.

Witness: – It happened very fast

It was too early to say anything about the cause of the fire, police said.

A witness at the scene, Håvard Røkland, told VG that the fire appeared to be breaking out very quickly.

– We went from one end of the parking lot to the other, and passed the building. During what we came to the other side, there was a full fire in the building. It happened very quickly, Røkland said.

According to Røkland, emergency services were quickly in place to deal with the fire.

– I can see from the cabin that it’s still smoking, but there doesn’t seem to be any over-ignition anymore.