POLICE are investigating the cause of a fire at a flat yesterday evening.

More than 30 firefighters from Strood, Chatham, Gillingham and Maidstone stations were called to the blaze above an empty camping shop on Chatham High Street just after 5pm.

Initial reports suggested people were trapped in the two-storey building but firefighters later discovered it was empty.

Firefighters spent five hours fighting the blaze above the shop, which had been standing empty for months, but a single storey extension at the back of the building was completely destroyed.

The fire broke out just weeks after flames ripped through a Turkish restaurant 500 metres away killing Paul Arnold, Rikki Sheehan and her two-year-old son Charlie.

Police are not linking the two incidents.