Fire razes heritage apartment building

MANILA, Philippines — Emma Gandawan choked with tears as she lamented how her neighbors blamed her for a fire that razed the apartment building and left over 182 families homeless in Sta. Cruz, Manila on Friday night.

The razed three-story building, built in the 1960s, was typical of a heritage house, complete with capiz window panes and old wood. 

All around, residents carted away galvanized roof sheets licked by the fire, and wood reduced to coals, to be sold to the junk shops. A man in a bicycle wheeled past with a day’s haul of burnt plumbing.

With soot on her arms from a day spent scouring through the remains of her home, Gandawan denied rumors that a candle from her kitchen started the blaze.

“Paano kami magkaka-kandila (How could we use candles)?” she said, explaining that her family was about to leave for the mall when the fire started. 

Gandawan said she heard something explode, and before she could do anything, a fire quickly spread in the complex.

As her 15-year-old daughter hugged her from behind, she said she has nowhere else to go to, having been separated from her husband whose family has rejected her.

For 74-year-old Rosalinda Mendoza, who lived next door in another antique house, she could still remember the beauty of that apartment house, which has been there even before she married and settled.

She was grateful her antique house was spared from the fire because of a firewall.

She lamented the razed apartment went into disrepair after years of being open for rent, its age betrayed by old wood and its capiz shell window panes.

“Nung bago yan, ang ganda ng bahay na yan. Ngayon bulok na... Dati tumitira, mga disenteng tao (When it was new, it was beautiful. Now it’s rotted through… Decent people used to live there),” Mendoza said.

The fire, which reached third alarm at around 7:30 p.m. and put out three hours later, resulted in P200,000 worth of damages, he said. No one was injured in the blaze.

QC fire leaves 50 families homeless

Meanwhile, at least 50 families were left homeless when a fire hit a slum area in Quezon City yesterday.

The blaze started at around 9:08 a.m. at the two-story house of Vanessa Lastimado in Barangay Bagbag, arson investigator Senior Fire Officer 1 Mark Stephen Trajeras said in a phone interview.

The flames started in the kitchen, located on the first floor. Probers have yet to pinpoint the cause of the fire. The fire was placed under control at around 10 a.m. and doused by 11:40 a.m.

A total of 18 houses made of light construction materials were razed to the ground, Trajeras said.

Firefighters had difficulty reaching the area because of the narrow roads, which were occupied by residents who tried to save their belongings.

In a separate text message, Quezon City Police District director Chief Superintendent Guillermo Eleazar said no one was killed in the fire.

A volunteer firefighter, Jaime Cuadras, sustained a laceration on his left hand.

Damage to property was placed at P200,000. – With Emmanuel Tupas