400 evacuated as office block burns in ‘fireworks display’

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Flames shot up the modern glass-fronted block "like a fireworks display" after a blaze broke out in a ventilation shaft yesterday.

High Holborn and surrounding streets were sealed off for several hours as 50 firefighters tackled the fire, which spread from a ground-floor Japanese restaurant to a plant room in the roof of MidCity Place in High Holborn. One person was treated for smoke inhalation.

Construction worker John Macdonnell, 50, said: "There was a huge flash and then another as it went higher and higher, like a string of firecrackers. The building was illuminated like a fireworks display."