This Is The Surprising Reason Why Grafton Street Was Blocked Last Sunday

You might have heard that Grafton Street was closed off on Sunday as Dublin Fire Brigade rushed to the scene of a reported fire.

Smoke Is Coming From This Grafton Street Shop Right Now

Members of the public reported that there was smoke coming from the building of Weir & Sons Jewellery, and the fire service was forced to block the street off to the public while they investigated the incident.

We're continuing to investigate on #GraftonSt & are assisting @GardaTraffic. No #fire found so far, possibly a security alert #Dublin pic.twitter.com/NUvqTiWJBK
— Dublin Fire Brigade (@DubFireBrigade) February 19, 2017

It has now been revealed that the 'smoke' seen by passersby was fog that was released by a highly sophisticated security system designed to temporarily block the vision of intruders.

David McCormack of Weir & Sons explained the situation to Dublin Live this week.

"The security system filled the shop with artificial fog, which the general public perceived as smoke, so the fire brigade were called. But, in fact, it was really a very effective protection device that was released in the event of alarms being activated.

"The fire brigade came and the gardai were alerted and I spoke to both of them to reassure them that there wasn't a fire but obviously, the fire brigade has protocols that it has to follow to assure there is no blaze."

The company can't reveal why the security system was activated but said that it was "deployed exactly as was intended to protect the store and it's contents".

The fog itself is completely harmless, has a menthol smell and doesn't harm stock.

Check out the video below to see a sample of the security smoke in action: