About 200 people were evacuated from an Inverness pub early yesterday when a fire broke out in a shed at the back of the building.
The incident at the Hootananny venue in Church Street happened less than three hours after about 70 people were evacuated from the ground floor of the Mercure Hotel in the same street because of a “suspected gas leak”.
Firefighters were called to the blaze in a shed behind Hootananny just before 2.20am yesterday and the incident at the hotel was reported just before 11.50pm on Saturday.
Kit Fraser, of Hootananny, said: “There were about 200 people in the building, who were evacuated on to the street for safety reasons.
“The night finishes at 3am so we sent everyone home a bit earlier.
“The fire was in an unused shed next to the smoking area at the back of the pub. The shed was about three yards from the main building.
“There was no danger to anybody. It was a very localised fire and it was dealt with very quickly and very efficiently by the fire brigade and the police.”
A fire service spokeswoman said the same two crews from Inverness attended both incidents and no one was hurt in either of them. She said firefighters used two sets of breathing apparatus, a hose reel jet and a dry powder extinguisher to tackle the fire at Hootananny, which caused 50% fire damage to the shed.
She added that the same appliances had been called to a suspected gas leak at the hotel shortly before midnight on Saturday when a carbon dioxide alarm went off in the swimming pool area.
About 70 guests, who had been attending a conference on the ground floor of the hotel, were moved to a function room on another floor. Susan Latto, a hotel manager, confirmed the first floor was evacuated.