Fire at the Avenues

I received two emails regarding a fire at the Avenues mall this morning. The last email I received stated that the damage from the fire effected the area from Debenhams up to as far as Top Shop and that some stores were still closed as of this moment and the mall was full of smoke and water.

According to an employee of iCity, a restaurant next to Starbucks caught fire. I also called D*lush and they told me that a large portion of the mall was currently cordoned off by police and that they couldn’t get close enough from their side to see what had happened. An employee of the store Carbon Fiber told me he didn’t know the name of the place that caught fire but it was near Columbus Cafe.

Update (11:55AM): My original source emailed back with an update. Currently the word is the cause of the fire was electrical and thats why it spread really fast. Esprit has also been completely obliterated which means that the fire also spread to the second floor not just the first.

Update (6:32PM): The Slider Station owner sent me a picture of some of the damage from the Avenues. I posted it above.

Update (11:12PM): According to my original source, the fire started on the 2nd floor (ESPRIT) and spread quickly. The sprinkler system came on and ended up flooding the stores below (Top Shop, Foot Locker). The smoke re-circulated through all of the air conditioning ducts and has smoke damaged all of the products in the stores below.

Jan 16, 2009

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Esprit After the Fire

39 Comments, add your own...

1. Ra7aLaH | January 16th, 2009 at 11:49 am

When did that happen?
2. Q80 BOY | January 16th, 2009 at 11:54 am

this morning
3. Ra7aLaH | January 16th, 2009 at 11:58 am

I just called the avenues the man said their still open o its just an eltmas k.hrbae bse6…22597777
4. Hiba | January 16th, 2009 at 12:13 pm

and i was just about to get dressed to go have lunch over there.. great having a blog that’s so up-to-the-minute!
5. Sara | January 16th, 2009 at 12:20 pm

So the avenues is open?? we have a movie to watch at 3:45??
6. Mark | January 16th, 2009 at 12:21 pm

Yes its open. Not sure if Cinescape is though. You could call and check.
7. Q80 BOY | January 16th, 2009 at 12:42 pm

any injuries ???
8. 12 | January 16th, 2009 at 12:44 pm

the avenues is huge so of course its open
9. Sean | January 16th, 2009 at 1:28 pm

Nooooo not TOPSHOP!
10. Flaming Carrot | January 16th, 2009 at 1:36 pm

Scary shit. Anyone know if anyone was hurt?
11. KS | January 16th, 2009 at 2:57 pm

Please stop saying ‘today morning’ and use ‘this morning’ instead…

‘I received two emails regarding a fire at the Avenues mall THIS morning.’

thats all :)
12. Mark | January 16th, 2009 at 2:59 pm

sorry its out of habit
13. Frankom | January 16th, 2009 at 3:19 pm

Always the avenues ! why not marina mall or Al Fanar for example hehe ! something wrong there !
14. ahmed | January 16th, 2009 at 3:24 pm

toni : sprinklers dont stop a fire. Just help not spreading it. But no way can it stop spreading a big fire. Im gussing it wasnt a minor fire if it spread up to the 2nd floor.
15. sinful eye's | January 16th, 2009 at 4:12 pm

singing :
“the roof.. the roof.. the roof is on fire …. the roof.. the roof.. the roof is on fire ”

@ Frankom :
cause the avenues is not in salmeiya .. and it’s near the (good people area’s)
and by the good people i mean the people who fight with 3ajrat !
16. suliman | January 16th, 2009 at 4:40 pm

hmmm intresting the avenues is a good place and has some bad 3ajaad mayeb they did somthing wrong this time and realy bad XD((they always pull the fire alarm in the avenus you wont know this time if it was real or fake))
17. Unknown | January 16th, 2009 at 6:06 pm

please post more pics
18. Frankom | January 16th, 2009 at 7:07 pm

hehe khosh reason then :P
19. Bu Yousef | January 16th, 2009 at 8:02 pm

Sorry Mark…

“Sorry, it’s out of habit.”

:)
20. hilaliya | January 16th, 2009 at 8:03 pm

What company does the electrical maintenance there?
21. john donne | January 16th, 2009 at 8:06 pm

maybe someone wanted to get an insurance payout.
22. TanGo | January 16th, 2009 at 8:57 pm

there is no fire on first floor – just second floor – ESPRIT
near shops are ok and all walls and structure already
repainted and near-by shops cleaned >> no injuries
23. Lucky_Boy | January 16th, 2009 at 9:29 pm

more photos on news site (arabic):
http://www.alaan.cc/client/pagedetails.asp?nid=26546&cid=48
24. suspic | January 17th, 2009 at 12:38 am

The roof was on fire?
25. Cerebral Assassin | January 17th, 2009 at 3:07 am

LOL :P
26. Khaled | January 17th, 2009 at 4:04 am

ummm.. you mentioned a shop called CARBON FIBER* but you spelt it CARBON FIRE, missing the B. heads up incase of copyright shit.
27. BoBader | January 17th, 2009 at 10:42 am

I guess the sprinkler did their job.

hilaliya:

Each store is responsible for doing their electrical work. Each store has its own circuit breaker. It looks like the electrical fire was localized to that store and probably cause by their own system.
28. SmoKeY | January 17th, 2009 at 4:10 pm

another reason why you shouldn’t open a mall in a very civil (not) area!!!

atleast vero moda is fine :)
29. Nobu | January 17th, 2009 at 11:07 pm

I think they say today morning in Canada or something. Canadians are weird with language.

Yeah Mark, stop saying today morning, it sounds retarded. Would you say today evening I went to the cinema? Exactly! It sounds like a Bengali speaking English.

Good day :)
30. holla | January 18th, 2009 at 12:29 am

good. i hope every mall in kwt burs to the ground lol
31. Brandon | January 18th, 2009 at 2:00 am

Can Bengalis speak english ? O.o ???
32. q8smoke | January 18th, 2009 at 12:37 pm

they had to clear their stock. their sales are sh*t despite their discounts so leave the coffee maker on before you close shop for the night. short circuit causes fire, sprinkler system minimizes damage to neighboring stores, get a phat insurance check. make money money money
33. M | January 18th, 2009 at 3:19 pm

guys i am looking for …..

Morphy Richards (electronics store) in kuwait. Whether it be its supply agents in Kuwait or itself?

If any one knows please inform me asap.

Thanks
34. Les | January 18th, 2009 at 3:35 pm

Guys.. something to thing about… “Bengalis can’t speak English” is an inaccurate generalization that’s probably based on the large workforce of mostly Bangaldeshi cleaners that are employed in Kuwait.

A large number if Bengalis are well educated people. Three of them have won Nobel Prizes!

“The Bengali poet and novelist, Rabindranath Tagore, became the first Nobel laureate from Asia when he won the 1913 Nobel Prize in Literature. Other Bengali Nobel laureates include Amartya Sen (1999 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences) and Muhammad Yunus (2006 Nobel Peace Prize).”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bengali_people

Now I’m not Bengali – but just saying…
35. Varma | January 19th, 2009 at 10:44 am

Les… Rabindranath Tagore and Amartya Sen are Indians not Bangladeshis.
36. Les | January 20th, 2009 at 3:06 pm

Varma – “Bengalis” refers to people who speak the Bengali language which is spoken in India and Bangladesh. Tagore and Sen qualify by that definition.

The term in Kuwait is “Bangali” – which even if it used to denote Bangladeshis – is a unfortunate stereotype as many are not uneducated.
38. dezignergirl | February 4th, 2009 at 10:04 pm

do u have more pics? u can totally post em’ up on youtube !

Esprit After the Fire - Jan 21st, 2009
When the wind blows - Jun 11th, 2009

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