Video of the fire

Is a firebug terrorizing the Auwiesen district?

If it was a coincidence, then it was a very strange one and already the fourth in just one month: the fire on two garbage islands in a residential complex in Linz-Auwiesen kept the Linz professional fire department and the Ebelsberg volunteer fire department busy on Tuesday night. Two injured people are in hospital and a suspect is being investigated.

"Two garbage islands were set alight. One was under a passageway, where smoke was coming up to the apartments on the left and right. People couldn't get out because the smoke was coming up through the open arcades.

When you opened the apartment door, smoke came in immediately," reports Johannes Metzger, head of operations for the Linz professional fire department about the firefighting operation at around 9.45 pm. Two residents had to be taken to hospital with suspected smoke inhalation.

Ebelsberg fire brigade also extinguished the fire
The professional fire department was deployed with 23 men and six vehicles and was supported by the Ebelsberg fire brigade, which was deployed with 14 firefighters and two vehicles. After 20 minutes, the fire was declared "out" and the operation was over after one and a half hours.

Not the first incident
The firefighters are concerned that the fire at the two garbage islands in Kreiskystraße - the second was 50 meters away - was not the first such incident in Auwiesen. "There was also a fire nearby a month ago," says Ebelsberg commander Manuel Studener.

On February 18 at around 5 a.m., several waste containers also caught fire, with three garbage rooms on fire. One person was handed over to the Red Cross. Garbage islands also burned on 10 March - the neighborhood is already talking about four arsons.

Description of the perpetrator
This time, however, a man was seen behaving suspiciously before the fire broke out. There is a vague description of him, but the police still hope that this will help: man, about 55 years old, wavy white-grey hair, white-grey full beard, black jacket.