Hundreds of people have been evacuated after a nine-storey Bourke Street building filled with smoke on Thursday afternoon.
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Trams were diverted after firefighters were called to the building at 3pm where some paper towels in a storage closet were alight.
The Metropolitan Fire Brigade said the entire building quickly filled with smoke, activating the fire alarms and forcing about 400 people to evacuate.
Firefighters wearing breathing apparatus entered the building and found the fire that took 23 minutes to bring under control. Damage was confined to the storage area.
Route 86 and 96 trams, which normally run up Bourke Street and through the Mall, were diverted along La Trobe Street, but have now resumed normal running.
Bourke St Melbourne: 3pm MFB crews are at a building fire on Bourke Street near Swanston Street.96 trams affected pic.twitter.com/pnaKAyXxMn— Incident Alert-VicSA (@incident_alert) July 2, 2015