A blaze swept through an 18th- century mansion in central Buckinghamshire Friday, causing an estimated $86 million in damage to the building owned by an Arab sheik and crammed wih antiques and artworks, officials and news reports said.
Officials, however, said they had not yet determined what started the blaze at Dropmore House in Burnham, 30 miles northwest of London.Flames, some 30-feet-high, damaged walls and ceilings and gutted the entire east wing of the stately $20 million house that included a room in which there were six solid gold chairs.
Authorities deployed more than 80 firemen and 12 fire engines to battle the blaze, which raged for nine hours before being controlled.
"The trouble with these old places is that once they get going they take an awful lot of stopping," a fire officer said. "These houses were not built with fire prevention in mind, so there is a lot of old timber and voids that fire spreads behind."
He said personnel had managed to retrieve many articles, but various other items were consumed by the flames. He would not estimate the cost of the damage, but the Evening Standard newspaper put the figure at about $86 million.
The house is owned by Mahdi Al-Tajir, a former ambassador to Britain for the United Arab Emirates who is one of the world's richest men. He has about 30 properties around the world, including three central London homes and castles in Kent and Scotland.
Al-Tajir, 58, is renowned as one of the world's greatest collectors of gold and silver. Armed robbers in January stole the equivalent of $8.6 million from Dropmore House, and Al-Tajir four years before paid about $3 million demanded by kidnappers as ransom for his brother.