Authorities in Melbourne are investigating a suspicious fire at a gym in South Melbourne that broke out early in the morning, in what is the second fire at the same premises in just the past 24 hours. The repeated targeting of the business has raised concerns that it was deliberately set.
The blaze was at the Rare Breed gym, around three kilometres south of Melbourne's central business district. It happened just after three o'clock in the morning, drawing a large emergency response as flames took hold of the building.
About 33 crew were called to the scene and took nearly 40 minutes to bring the fire under control. By the time they arrived, flames and smoke were billowing from the 350 square metre building, and firefighters had to don breathing apparatus to get inside and tackle the blaze.
It was only 24 hours earlier that the gym had first been targeted. In that incident, a car was rammed into the roller door at the front of the premises and a small fire was set inside, causing much smaller damage. According to the account, arsonists then came back to complete the job.
After the first attack, the gym owners had posted on social media in a defiant tone. They wrote that a building can be damaged but a community cannot, adding that Rare Breed was built on resilience and that one thing is certain, they will not stop. At the time, they had hoped to be reopening within a week.
That timeline now looks far less likely, with this latest fire causing far more substantial damage to the gym. The owners said they were assisting police with their investigations as detectives work to establish exactly what happened and who was responsible.
It remains unclear whether police will examine the case as part of Operation Eclipse, a major police operation that was launched after a spate of arson attacks and fire bombings on hospitality venues at about 35 different sites. For now, it is not known whether the same detectives are looking into the gym fires.