‘May ISIS, may ISIS!’

MANILA, Philippines - The shouts of guests racing down to the ground floor about the presence of an Islamic State (IS) man in a black hood interrupted a casino dealer while he was preparing his table Thursday midnight at the Resorts World complex.

“May ISIS, may ISIS… nakatalukbong (There is ISIS, in a hood),” the dealer heard guests say, before a burst of gunfire erupted on the second floor.

Pandemonium followed as everybody on the ground floor ran and sought cover as the gunman continued firing, the 22-year-old dealer, who asked not to be named, told The STAR in a phone interview.

“I did not see the gunman, but I could hear the loud bursts of his weapon,” he added.

The casino’s unarmed guards tried to calm down the crowd but there was chaos and everyone was seeking a way out of the building.

Hearing the shots, the casino dealer said he also headed toward the revolving door.

“I was almost trapped because the door was moving slowly,” he recounted.

Once outside, he heard more shots fired, forcing him again to seek cover. He saw some guests, including some Koreans and Chinese, exiting the hotel barefoot, carrying their luggage.

Soon, lights went out as a fire broke out, trapping some casino employees and hotel guests inside.

It was only after firefighters arrived that the casino dealer decided to go back to his boarding house near the Villamor Air Base.

“I was lucky. But 13 of my friends were not. They all died, trapped in the casino,” he said.

All 13, including his supervisor, were assigned at the second floor.

“I can only weep while watching the news,” he said.

The gunman who stormed the casino was calm and looked confident before beginning his rampage, recalled guest Eric Calderon III.

Calderon had just finished dinner in a restaurant when he saw the gunman, just about 10 meters away, brandishing a long firearm and entering the casino.

When the mayhem began, Calderon and two other persons sought refuge in a kitchen where they covered themselves with trash bags and kept quiet for around eight hours until security guards and firefighters rescued them.

Stephen Reilly, Resorts World Manila chief operating officer, commended the bravery of security guards Bernard Cajigas and Petronio Kinol Jr., who shot and wounded the gunman.

The injury, Reilly said, led to a “severe blood loss (that) significantly slowed the assailant down and resulted in his holing up in a room where he took his own life.”

Reilly thanked the Philippine National Police and the Bureau of Fire Protection “for their courage and efforts to contain the incident.” He denied reports that it was the PNP that wounded the suspect.  – With Robertzon Ramirez, Emmanuel Tupas