• RICHARD T. CABALLERO JR.
Following the devastating fire incident in Barangay 27 on Friday, the Bureau of Fire Protection – Bacolod City, Fire Marshall FSupt. Jenny Mae Masip admitted that the city is in need of more fire trucks.
Masip explained that if the city had more fire trucks, the fire alarm on the recent residential fire would possibly not have been raised to level 3. She added that the BFP decided to raise the fire alarm to that level for the neighboring cities and municipalities to provide additional fire trucks.
The Bacolod City BFP is currently operating with15 fire trucks from 9 substations across the city.
The fire broke out in Brgy. 27 on Friday was reported by a walk-in citizen at the Lopez Jaena substation, which is the nearest to the area. Unfortunately, just minutes before the report, the stationed fire truck was responding to a separate residential fire in Brgy. Granada.
“That is one of our preparations (seeking additional fire trucks) so that in case this kind of fire incident happens again, we can prevent it from affecting a huge number of homes,” Masip said.
Moreover, the BFP is pushing for the establishment of another substation in Brgy. Banago for more effective and efficient service. That barangay has been tagged as a red zone area, being prone to fire incidents.
“Hopefully the substation in Banago will be established because that is part of our red zone prevention program,” she added.
CLARIFICATION
Hours after the fire consumed at least 234 houses, allegations rose against Megaworld as some displaced individuals claimed that the company prohibited fire trucks from passing on their private property.
The allegations grabbed the attention of the BFP, which later released a statement to clarify that the accusations against Megaworld were untrue.
“We wish to clarify that Megaworld did not prevent our fire trucks from entering their property. On the contrary, Megaworld allowed our units to access and preposition inside their property, which enabled our firefighters to conduct firefighting operations more effectively,” it said.
Furthermore, in a separate statement released by the Chamber Fire Volunteer Brigade, who also responded to the incident, said that Megaworld Corporation had been cooperative with the firefighters during the incident.
“The company immediately granted access to the responding fire trucks and personnel, thereby facilitating quick entry and assistance to help control and extinguish the fire,” it said.*
