Automotive Industrial Distributors (AID) on Wulff Road was destroyed by a fire, which reportedly started in the warehouse section of the building late Thursday afternoon.
The blaze forced a shutdown of the immediate area and at one point came dangerously close to the nearby Shell gas station.
Police closed Wulff Road from the Marathon Road roundabout to Mackey Street and directed all traffic away from the area.
Officials said all employees were safely evacuated after the fire started shortly after 4 p.m.
One of the chief concerns for authorities as well as for residents of the area was that the fire was being fueled by flammable material in AID, a popular home and auto parts establishment that has been in the community for decades.
Rohan Deal, an employee at AID, said he crawled out of a bathroom in the building after the fire started.
He said he heard things explode and pop around him as he ran for his life.
"I basically saw a lot of black smoke, so I went by memory and hit the floor, crawled on all fours, because that's where the oxygen spots are, and I just crawled all the way from the bathroom section in (the parts (section), to the warehouse section, went through the door and just tried to run for it," Deal said.
"I was just trying to get the hell out, trying to survive. I put my shirt over my face, trying to breathe and trying not to inhale so much smoke."
When The Nassau Guardian arrived on the scene AID was fully engulfed in flames.
Three fire trucks and a Bahamas Electricity Corporation bucket truck were used to help fight the blaze.
A backhoe was also used to tear the side of the building open near where the fire began so firefighters could reach farther into the store with their hoses. When the walls came down smoke and fire billowed out.
The men had to cap a line that led to Shell's diesel storage tank with a wet rag to prevent a gas explosion.
Assistant Superintendent of Police Craig Stubbs said the wind helped to prevent the fire spreading to the diesel line.
He added that the smoke in the area was so thick that everyone in the nearby Wulff Road Police Station had to be evacuated, including the prisoners.
Stubbs said two men were arrested at the scene of the fire. He said one man was brandishing a knife.
All of AID's employees were accounted for when firefighters arrived on the scene, according to Stubbs.
By early evening, the front walls of the building fell down. Not long after, firefighters brought the fire under control.
There was no immediate estimate of the damage and it was unclear what started the blaze.
This is the latest of several major fires that occurred in recent months.
The largest fire was the one that ripped through a portion of Bay Street on February 14.

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