A LARGE fire in a residential area caused extensive damage to four houses yesterday evening.

Police have confirmed that a 32 yer-old man was arrested and taken into custody at Camborne Police Station following the fire, which is being treated as suspicious.

The fire spread to a number of adjacent properties which were also evacuated.

South West Ambulance Service attended the scene, but there were no reports of any casualties.

Police will be working with Cornwall Fire and Rescue Service to investigate the cause.  

Cornwall Fire and and Rescue Service's Critical Control Centre received numerous 999 calls from the public since around 5.15pm informing of a fire in a property in Illogan.

A fire service spokesman said: "An initial attendance of appliances from Tolvaddon and Hayle attended. On arrival firefighters confirmed the property was well alight and requested three additional fire appliance and further support vehicles to tackle the blaze.

"Firefighters are using six breathing apparatus, four hose reel jets, two main jets, 135 ladder and triple extension ladders.

"The fire has started to spread to the roofs of adjacent properties and the incident ground has been sectorised into two."

Initially crews from Tolvaddon and Hayle attended, but eight additional fire crews from Penzance, Truro, Perranporth and St Just community Fire Stations with were later mobilised.

Firefighters wearing breathing apparatus and using multiple jets made good progress at the incident.

The Welfare Unit was mobilised from St Dennis community Fire Station to provide water and refreshments for crews on scene.

Just after 9.30pm the incident was scaled back to two pumping appliances, where fire crews monitored hotspots.

At around midnight the incident was handed over to the police who remained in attendance. 

The minor road between Illogan and Bridge was blocked in both directions for several hours yesterday evening.

Traffic could not access Bridge Hill to Church Road due to the blaze, which is believed to have got into the roof space of the some of the houses.

The incident, which began just after 5pm, also affected bus services 46/47.