The Quadrant Mall in Launceston was blocked off for 30 minutes on Tuesday afternoon as firefighters worked to extinguish a fire in a vacant building.
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Launceston Fire Service officer Adrian Gill said some contractors' renovations works and hot sparks dropped down through the floors and set alight some polystyrene pods that had been stored on the first floor.
"It was very difficult to gain access, there was a lot of smoke, not a lot of fire," he said.
"We probably spent around 30 minutes gaining access to try and find the location of a fire, then being able to extinguish the fire and ventilate the building so we could visually see what we were doing."
Mr Gill said the smoke was quite significant and crews had low visibility and had a hard time locating the fire.
He said a crew inside the building were able to locate the source of the fire as a result of thermal cameras.
He also said there were about six contractors on-site doing renovation works and there were a couple of people caught in the top floor.
"They put a ladder up themselves and self evacuated and there were some people downstairs that evacuated as well," Mr Gill said.
"We got a triple zero call from one of the occupants to say there was a fire in the building.
He said construction workers were working on a suspended floor and the flooring would need to be re-engineered and pulled up.
"It could be a $100,000 fire," Mr Gill said.
Fire investigators have determined that the cause of the fire was accidental.
No injuries were reported.
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