Nearly 800 hotel guests evacuated due to fire at Holiday World complex on Costa del Sol
The blaze has been extinguished but the fire brigade's evacuation order is being maintained due to the amount of smoke accumulated inside the building.
A total of 794 guests at the Polynesia hotel, one of the accommodation blocks that make up the Holiday World complex in Benalmadena on the Costa del Sol, have had to be evacuated due to a fire that apparently originated on the terrace of the building.
According to the municipal fire chief in Benalmádena, David Bañasco, although the flames were extinguished in a short period of time, the amount of smoke accumulated inside the building forced the precautionary evacuation of the hotel as it reached contaminant levels.
The general manager of Holiday World, Mari Francis Peñarroya, explained that the cause of the fire could have been a poorly extinguished cigarette butt and she praised the speed it was extinguished, both on the part of the hotel's security team and the town's fire brigade and police forces.