Spanish firefighters were battling to put out a huge fire that gutted a multi-storey apartment block in Valencia on Thursday, the emergency services said.

At least 13 people have been injured, including a child and six firefighters, regional officials said, without providing details on the extent of the injuries.

Images showed flames and vast clouds of black smoke engulfing the building in the Campanar neighbourhood of the eastern port city, with 22 teams of firefighters called in to fight the fire which also spread to a neighbouring building.

Spain’s TVE public television said there were more than 130 flats in the 14-storey building which had been rapidly “reduced to a skeleton”.

The fire began around 5.30 pm on the fourth floor and rapidly spread, witnesses said.

Luis Ibanez, who lives in a nearby building, told TVE he had looked out of the window and saw the flames engulfing the block “within a matter of minutes”, saying it was “as if it was made of cork”.

“I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. The whole side of the building directly opposite was on fire, from the first floor to the sixth and seventh floor,” he said.

“There was a really strong wind and the fire was spreading to the left at a huge speed.”

One resident called Vicente, who was returning home, said he got back to find the building in flames, telling TVE he thought everyone had been safely evacuated.

“I think they all got out,” he said.

Footage on social media which was reposted by Spanish media outlets showed a father and daughter being rescued from a balcony where they had been trapped.

“Please stay away from the area of the fire to let the emergency services do their work,” Valencia’s mayor Maria Jose Catala urged local residents on X.

A woman who runs a nearby flower shop told public television the building was no more than 14 years old and had more than 100 flats, all of which were occupied.

“What caused the fire to spread was mostly the wind,” she said, describing scenes of “chaos” as the blaze took hold, snarling traffic and sending clouds of smoke everywhere.

Writing on X, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said he was “shocked by the terrible fire” and was in contact with the mayor and the region’s leader “to offer whatever help needed” and extending his condolences to everyone affected by the blaze.

In October last year, a fire gutted a nightclub in the neighbouring region of Murcia, claiming 13 lives in what was Spain’s deadliest nightclub fire in three decades.

Six people have been charged as part of a manslaughter probe and could face up to nine years behind bars if the deaths were found to be the result of negligence.