When Caroline Bustin heard the fire engine sirens at around 3.15am, she immediately leapt out of bed and looked out of her first floor window. What she saw on Goethestraße reminded her of the terrible pictures on the television news. “It’s like being in a civil war,” thought the 23-year-old student. She could see burning cars and rubbish bins. A hedge was on fire. “Our street is burning,” she said on Twitter. One of the burning cars belonged to her: a 20-year-old Fiesta that she had just got through the Tüv (roadworthiness test).

When she woke her mother, there was a strong smell of burning in the air and clouds of smoke were rising into the night. A window of the student’s car had been smashed and the car set on fire. The car was completely destroyed. “It smelled of methylated spirit,” reported Caroline Bustin. The police took the car away as evidence. The following morning, the young woman had only the door handle of her car left.

The Swisttal fire brigade arrived quickly and began putting out the fires around 3.20am. As well as the student’s car, another car was completely on fire. Only the bumper panelling was alight or the number plate burning on four other cars.

Rubbish bins were also set alight in Schillerstraße, which in turn set a hedge and a tree in a front garden on fire. “We were woken by the sirens and looked outside and the hedge as already on fire,” reported a 40-year-old resident. Luckily the fire brigade soon had everything under control.

The Könens were extremely lucky. Neighbours leaving on holiday noticed that the Könens’ rubbish bins, kept under the wooden carport, were on fire, along with their neighbours’ two cars. They rang the neighbours’ bell and Michael Etzbauer quickly took stock of the situation. He used a garden hose to extinguish his two cars and the Könens’ rubbish bin. In doing so, he perhaps prevented a disaster. Had the carport and the firewood stored there also caught fire, the house could easily have been set alight.

26 firemen worked until shortly before 5am. Luckily no-one was injured. “To my knowledge, we’ve not had a case like this in Swisttal before,” said fire chief Buhl.

An initial search by police that night was unsuccessful. Investigators from the criminal police were at Goethestraße the following morning talking to those affected and documenting evidence. The burnt out cars were taken away for further evidence gathering early in the morning. Police were unable to comment yesterday on the perpetrators’ methods.

Anyone who saw suspicious people in the area of the incident or who has any information is asked to call Bonn police on 0228 150.

(Original text: Hans-Peter Fuss. Translated by Kate Carey.)