Tairua Police Station fire no longer considered suspicious; police car and garage lost

A fire that destroyed a garage and a cop car at a Coromandel Peninsula police station is no longer considered suspicious.

Emergency services were called to Tairua Police Station, 48km east of Thames, at 5.20am, Inspector Mike Henwood said this morning, adding the fire was being treated as suspicious.

However, early this afternoon a police spokesman confirmed the cause of the fire was no longer considered suspicious.

The Herald asked police for more details on the possible cause, but a spokesman referred comment to Fire and Emergency New Zealand.

Police began trialling the use of BMW i4 electric vehicles in 2023, but the spokesman told the Herald he didn’t know whether the police car destroyed in Tairua was an EV or not.

Fire and Emergency Northern Communications shift manager Michael Anderson said a fire investigator had been at the scene this morning, but Anderson didn’t have any information on preliminary findings.

However, Coromandel’s CFM radio station posted on Facebook that it had been told by fire investigators and police that initial investigations showed an electrical fault caused the fire.

Fire and Emergency says a double garage was destroyed in a fire at Tairua Police Station this morning that also claimed a police car. Photo / Google Street View

Henwood said earlier no one was hurt in the blaze but there had been property damage.

The garage and a police car at the rear of the station have been destroyed, while the station has received minimal damage, said Henwood, the police Eastern Waikato area commander.

Anderson said around eight firefighters from the Tairua and Pauanui volunteer fire brigades were sent to the fire, which occurred in a double garage.

They left the scene just after 7am, he said.

Cherie Howie is an Auckland-based reporter who joined the Herald in 2011. She has been a journalist for more than 20 years and specialises in general news and features.