They joined other crews to form a task force of around 40 Scottish Fire and Rescue personnel tackling the outbreak in Darvel.

Several 999 calls were made just after 5pm on Thursday, August 20, with crews from Newmilns and Kilmarnock initially mobilised to the scene.

On their arrival, they found the premises, at Station Gate, well-alight with the roof partially collapsed, prompting a call for reinforcements from Mauchline, Dreghorn, and Strathaven.

Thermal imaging cameras, and specialist breathing equipment were used to augment several high-powered hose reel jets which were trained on the fire.

The operation to extinguish the flames carried on well into the night. with monitoring and dampening down carried out until 6.45am, when control of the incident was passed to the police.

Dampening down operations continued into the early morning and East Ayrshire Council building control officers attended the scene.