Electrical mishap possible cause of P175M warehouse fire in Liloan, Cebu

A warehouse in Barangay Jubay, Liloan town, was hit by the fire that damaged at least P175 million worth of property on Sunday, June 26, 2022. | Photo courtesy of Shayne Chi via Paul Lauro

CEBU CITY, Philippines — Fire investigators initially considers electrical mishap as the possible cause of the fire that hit a warehouse in Sitio Fatima, Barangay Jubay in Liloan town on Sunday afternoon, June 26, 2022.

Liloan Fire Station ground commander Shoji Mendaros said the fire might have started due to an electrical mishap. However, he could not tell the details for now of the possible circumstance of its ignition.

Mendaros said that they have also identified which area the fire started from, but this is still subject to verification.

“Actually, sa area nga na cover, nahagsa mn sya, duna tay nakita nga area nga didto possible nag start ang sunog, sa portion sa factory building. Hopefully today makuha na nato information,” Mendaros said.

The fire destroyed an estimated P175 million worth of property, affecting at least an area of 5,000 square meters.

Mendaros added that they initially knew that there were no workers present at that time as they have no work on Sundays. Only the security guard, who was stationed in front of their compound, was present when the incident happened.

Mendaros said that the roadway heading to the warehouse was narrow, which made their response much more challenging.

“Dali ra kay sya nihagsa, nitabon ang roofing sa mga content sa factory. DIli dali gyud pagpenetrate pod sa atoang firefighting kay natabunan na sa mga sin. Unya nag involve manig mga chemicals sa ilang produkto [air freshener] so dili nato dayun maigo ang base of fire,” he added.

The fire that hit this warehouse lasted for about 11 hours before firefighters declared this as “fire out” at 2 a.m. on Monday, June 27, 2022.

They received a call around 3:08 p.m.  It was later raised to third and fourth alarms around 3:28 p.m. and 3:57 p.m. respectively.

Around 4:12 p.m. this was then raised to Task Force-Bravo and past 5 p.m., the fire was placed under control.

With this incident, Mendaros reminds warehouse owners to always check their precautionary measures, especially those hazard zones inside their factories. He said factories must comply with fire safety requirement of the Bureau of Fire Protection.

/bmjo

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