A fire at Norbert Dentressangle’s Easton distribution centre, near Grantham, last week damaged approximately half of a warehouse there containing pet food, Lincolnshire Fire and Rescue has confirmed.

The blaze broke out at around 2.45pm on Monday 15 July and resulted in "severe damage by fire to 50% of the warehouse used for processing pet food, with severe damage by smoke to the rest of the factory", a spokeswoman for the fire service told Motortransport.co.uk. The blaze was still ongoing 24 hours later, with fire service personnel remaining in attendance until Wednesday afternoon.

It is understood approximately 70 fire service staff were tackling the blaze at its peak. An investigation into the cause of the fire has since started, confirmed the spokeswoman.

Phil Shaw, MD of  ND Logistics UK, told MT on Wednesday afternoon that the fire had been "contained" and that all ND staff at the site, who number over 100, had been safely evacuated. On Thursday morning, he confirmed the fire had been extinguished and that emergency services had left the scene.

"A small amount of stock has been damaged but the main customer operations were successfully migrated to other sites," he added. "We have already recommenced operations from the site and normal service has been resumed."

ND declined to say which customers' goods were affected or how much disruption to deliveries was caused by the event.