It will take a number of days to identify the cause of the blaze that gutted the offices of media group Caxton in Johannesburg on Friday night, an emergency-services spokesperson said on Saturday.
Malcolm Midgley said police forensic experts will have to photograph the scene and investigate.
”It should take five days to find out the cause,” he said.
Midgley said a fireman who was injured in the fire was ”doing fine”. The fireman was slightly burnt and was taken to hospital for treatment.
The two-storey building was completely destroyed in the blaze.
It was not known what time the fire started, but it was already raging by the time crews of firefighters arrived at the scene at 9.30pm.
The building next door was also smoke-logged, and inaccessible.
”All you see inside is burnt-out computers,” Midgley said on Friday night.
Northern Johannesburg community papers manager Karen Geurtse was attending the Sanlam Awards for the community press in Sandton when security called to alert her to the fire.
She did not know what started the fire and could not conform that there had been a big bang before the building burst into flames.
The building houses the offices of seven community newspapers.
”We might lose fine detail, but we will be able to save the majority of them,” Geurtse said. — Sapa