Cagayan de Oro City – Two local residents were lightly injured while a firefighter was also hurt responding to a fire incident at Barangay 15 here Sunday morning.
The fire fighter suffered injury in a fire truck accident.
“The blaze gutted two houses to the ground. It started in the house of Maria Luz Martinez Tion, on the second floor,” said SFO3 Samsun Velarde, District Executive Senior Fire Officer of the Cagayan de Oro City Fire District 1.
As to the cause of the fire, Velarde added, “we are still investigating to pinpoint the source, but one of the angles we are looking at would be electrical wiring causes, which could involve improperly or illegally tapped electrical connections. This incident happened right after electricity was restored following a power outage. Again, this is not yet final as we are still conducting our investigation.”
Two of the residents incurred minor burn injuries on their arms, while the firefighter was injured when two fire trucks crashed into each other.
“Those who suffered burns were identified as Analyn Quintao and Mercedez Oclida, both were immediately treated,” said Velarde.
According to police report, the fire truck of the Gaisano Fire Volunteer group hit the fire truck of the Chinese Fire Volunteer organization at the corner of Velez and Borja streets.
The report did not indicate the identity the injured firefighter who was driving the Gaisano fire truck.
Velarde said prompt response after the raising of the fire alarm helped in the quick control of the blaze.
“Because the houses here are made out of light, easily combustible materials and built next to one another, we immediately raised the alarm from 1st to 4th alarm. This prompted several fire stations to quickly respond. As of our initial assessment, we had about five fire stations and then an additional three fire volunteer stations that responded to our fire alarm,” Velarde said.
Tion, who owned the house where the fire started, pointed out that the blaze might have started in one of the rented rooms.
“We have four borders living in our house, only my children were the ones left in our home when the fire started. Unfortunately they were not able to retrieve anything, as the fire started on our second floor, in one of the rented rooms. My husband and I were not around when the incident happened. We were in Balubal,” said Tion.
According to the city fire district, they received the call and fire alarm at around 8:26 in the morning and the blaze was declared “fire out” at around 8:55 a.m.. The initial estimate of damage was put at PhP300,000.
All photographs by Erwin M. Mascariñas, News5 | InterAksyon
