Marc VDS Racing Team crew members were unharmed when a fire broke out in its garage ahead of the Japanese Grand Prix.

The incident occurred on the eve of track activity at Motegi in the Moto2 team’s garage, which is between those used by the Suzuki and Aprilia MotoGP teams.

The circuit’s firefighters helped get the blaze under control quickly, while Team Suzuki Ecstar was also given glowing praise for helping to clean up afterwards.

According to Marc VDS, the fire started when water which had got into its garage caused a starter motor to short circuit.

A brief, initial statement from the team via Twitter read, “Fortunately, all the team members are well and safe despite the fire in our garage.

“Thanks a lot to everybody who is caring and especially to those on site helping to control the situation.”

A later statement advised, “After extinguishing the fire in the garage, proper inspections showed that the fire started when some rain water entered the garage, and got onto the floor where it caused a shortcut in a charger.

“That in turn let off some sparks, which then quickly grew into a fire.

“Fortunately, due to the amazing job done by all the paddock people that were there, the Circuit Security and Circuit firemen, damages were thankfully kept to a minimum.

“The Elf Marc VDS Team wants to publicly thank the work and huge help provided by all our paddock colleagues, with a special mention to the [Suzuki MotoGP] team who worked with us to clean and rebuild the garage as if it was their own.

“With all our team members safe and the garage rebuilt, we are ready to start the [Japanese Grand Prix today].”

Practice for each of the three classes starts this afternoon local time/AEST.