Ninety incidents, many of them connected to the lighting of Easter bonfires were attended by the fire service in the 24 hours leading up to Saturday morning, spokesman Andreas Kettis said.

Of the 51 cases that involved fires, 32 were in the Larnaca district where young people had lit fires in various places.

“The Larnaca district was intensely active, especially in the early hours of the morning, in incidents of young people creating lambradjies (Easter bonfires),” he said.

The 32 fires in Larnaca were attended in Larnaca town, Kiti, Tersefanou, Aradippou, Pyla, and Kornos.

“The effort to handle the incidents was also supported by (the emergency response unit) Emak, with a partial recall of personnel,” Kettis said.

Also, in Limassol at 30 minutes after midnight, three fire engines responded to a fire on the ground floor of a two-storey house in Erimi, which were joined by two more engines from the British Bases.

The fire damaged a storage room and the kitchen of the house, while the ground floor of the rest of the house was also affected by smoke.

A storeroom of a neighbouring house was protected by the fire brigade.

It looks as if the fire started in the kitchen, Kettis said.

At 8.13 on Friday night, the service responded to a fire in an abandoned house in the Ekali area of Limassol in which the remains of a motorbike were found.

The matter was handed over to the police, which said the motorcycle had been reported stolen on March 3.