A huge fire engulfed Brazil's 200-year-old National Museum in Rio de Janeiro, lighting up the night sky with towering flames as firefighters and museum workers raced to save historical relics from the blaze.
The esteemed museum, which houses artefacts from Egypt, Greco-Roman art and some of the first fossils found in Brazil, was closed to the public at the time of the fire, which broke out at 7:30 p.m. Sunday local time, it said in a statement.
There were no reports of injuries and it wasn't immediately clear how the fire began.
Fire department spokesman Roberto Robadey said 80 firefighters were battling the blaze and that by midnight local time the blaze was ``just about under control'' and should be out within a few hours..