BY DOMINIQUE GABRIEL G. BAÑAGA
BACOLOD City – Six houses were gutted by a fire that hit a neighborhood in Purok Cagaycay, Barangay 2 early Friday morning.
Two people were also injured.
The fire broke out around 2:45 a.m. and reached Second Alarm status, according to Fire Chief Inspector Rodel Legaspi, Bureau of Fire Protection (BFP) fire marshal for Bacolod.
Additional fire trucks were called in from other parts of the city.
A “fire out” was declared at 3:23 a.m.
Property damage was estimated to have reached P300,000.
According to arson investigators of the BFP, the fire began in the house of a certain Magdalena Pigo Patioca, and it spread fast to adjacent houses made of light materials.
Fortunately, the rainy weather helped firefighting efforts. The blaze was contained only to a small area of Purok Cagaycay.
This was the second fire incident to take place in Barangay 2 this month. The first was in neighboring Purok Sigay just this April 5.
The area is no stranger to fires. In 2017, it was struck by a blaze caused by a fight between a husband and a wife destroying at least 80 to 90 percent of the houses.
In 2019, more than 200 houses were destroyed by a fire there. The conflagration was attributed to arson – a woman allegedly threw a lamp following a heated argument with her live-in partner.
The resulting fire torched 90 percent of the community and the woman was subsequently held by the police for “safe keeping” because residents were angry.
Just this March 31, BFP vowed to open more fire stations in Bacolod, particularly in the northern part of this city.
Most are concentrated in the southern area, acknowledged Fire Chief Inspector Legaspi.
He vowed to address the disparity.
Among the fire stations in the southern part of Bacolod City are the Rodriguez sub-fire station, Sum-ag sub-fire station, Libertad Fire Station, the Granada sub-fire station, the Pahanocoy sub-fire station, and the Mansilingan sub-fire station.
Two auxiliary fire units – the Taculing and the newly-created Handumanan fire auxiliary unit – are also located in the southern part of the city.
The closest fire station to the northern part of the city is the Lopez Jaena Fire Station, near the Burgos Public Market.
Legaspi said they are hoping to find a suitable location, preferably a donated land, where they could base their firefighting equipment./PN
