Mona Vale Rd, Ingleside: More than 25 rare collectable cars destroyed in massive storage facility fire
At least 25 rare and collectable cars housed in storage sheds on Sydney’s northern beaches have been destroyed when a massive blaze ripped through the facility. See the latest here.
Manly
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Rare and collectable cars — some worth hundreds of thousands of dollars — have been destroyed in a fire on Sydney’s northern beaches.
The vehicles were stored in three former tomato growing sheds on Mona Vale Rd at Ingleside when the blaze broke out just before 9.39am.
Witnesses reported seeing a huge plume of black smoke billowing from the facility — which has a total of seven sheds — near the intersection of Powderworks Rd.
One vehicle owner, Michael Ossipoff, of Palm Beach, arrived at the facility to find that four cars he stored there, had been destroyed or badly damaged.
Mr Ossipoff lost a rare 1962 V8 Studebaker and Austin Healy sports car as well as a VW Kombi and a Renault. They were insured.
He said he was sad t lose the cars, including the Studebaker which he said was the only one of its type in Australia.
“It’s not looking good. I’d say most of them are gone.
“I rebuilt the Austin Healy. It had a lot of my DNA on it.
“They’re only cars. They’re nice, but it’s not like it’s something important.
“There’s always another car, I guess.”
Grahame Butler, of Mona Vale, who owns a 2008 Holden VE Commodore SSV, being stored at the site, said he feared his beloved vehicle was destroyed in the fire.
Mr Butler, who works for an excavation company, was driving his truck along Mona Vale Rd just before 9.30, when he saw plumes of black smoke billowing from the complex.
He pulled over and raced up the hill to check on the fire.
“I thought it might have been a truck fire, but then I saw the smoke coming out of the sheds,” he told The Manly Daily. “I thought ‘please don’t let it be my car’.
“It is my nest egg.”
Mr Butler said he was still awaiting notification from authorities on the fate of the cars.
Residents Laura Loehr and Arielle Zandstra, who live opposite the storage sheds, said they smelled smoke when they woke up before leaving their house and being confronted by massive amounts of black smoke.
“I first thought the fire was in the house because the smell was really string,” Ms Loehr said.
“Then I walked outside and saw there was a fire here.”
Ms Zandstra said she saw giant plumes of thick black smoke.
“We came outside, held hands and started praying together because there was a lot of commotion and we heard a few heavy ‘bangs’.
About 50 firefighters, including 30 from the Rural Fire Service and seven NSW Fire and Rescue trucks were called in.
RFS commander Scott Crosweller said no homes were threatened and no people were injured, but multiple triple zero calls were received.
He described the structures as former glasshouses and tomato sheds made out of fibreglass and chicken wire and that nothing could be done to save the vehicles ranging from the 1950s onwards.
“The fire is under investigation to determine its cause.”
The facility also houses boats and caravans.
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