Emergency crews attend bin chute arson at Invicta House

Invicta House

Four fire engines and the height vehicle attended a bin chute fire believed to have been started deliberately at Invicta House in Margate during the early hours of this morning (February 6).

Crews were called at 1.09am. Smoke was reported on the 9th and 11th floors.

A Kent Fire and Rescue Service spokesperson said: “Kent Fire and Rescue Service was called to flats in Millmead Road, Margate, following reports of a fire in a bin store.

“Four fire engines and a height vehicle attended. The building’s sprinklers contained the fire, and crews dampened down hot spots.

“The fire is believed to have been started deliberately.”

Crews finished at the scene at 2am. Residents say it was the second bin chute fire in just over 24 hours following a similar incident at around midnight on Thursday.

Kent Police has been asked for further details.

The block now has CCTV following a spate of arsons at the site in 2018 and 2019.

A series of fire safety upgrades were installed at the start of last year including compartmentation works, fire doors, alarms, smoke vents, and flat entrance doors, as well as upgrades to electrical installations and the CCTV. However, residents say there are some issues with fire doors not closing properly.

The upgrades were part of a £14.5million investment in council owned towerblocks in a three year scheme. Some £8.9million is due to be spent on works in the coming financial year (April 2021-March 2022).

5 Comments

  1. Whoever is doing this must have several screws loose to say it mildly.
    Luckily sprinklers were working and checking CCTV should spot the culprit/s. This stupidity could potentially take the lives of innocent people who must be frightened living there with so many of these fires over the past few years. Is it someone from inside with mental health issues? as surely the doors are secure to anyone walking in.

    • Doors are not secure, never have been, it’s an issue that has been constantly brought up with TDC, Mears, and East Kent housing for several years. The new fire doors don’t close, the new stair well’s emergency lighting has failed at least once, the new bin chutes are so small as to be practically unusable, and at least one lift, sometimes both are broken multiple times a month.
      A few people have made a lot of money from “renovation” of the block, residents have had a year of noise and inconvenience.
      But as always, nothing gets fixed.

      • All those things are important, but this is bigger than that Dave. We literally have a psychopath with a screw loose free. Terrorism charges are needed. One day it will be fatal

      • Just wait until the time they get round to redoing the insulation ( if they go ahead with it) it’ll be huge amounts of disruption massively expensive and make yet another contractor rich.
        TDC masters at getting work badly done for maximum cost.

  2. This needs to be taken more seriously and the people doing it deserve to go away for the attempted murder of many numbers of people. What is the difference between this and terrorism?

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