7 hurt, 125 families homeless in San Juan fire bomb attack

MANILA, Philippines — At least 125 families were left homeless and seven individuals were injured when a fire, caused by a molotov cocktail being thrown into a house, razed a residential community in San Juan City earlySunday morning.

Chief Insp. Greg Domowey, the San Juan City fire marshal, said the fire along 3rd West Crame, Barangay West Crame, which started at around 2:23 a.m. and reached the fourth alarm, was caused by two unidentified men who threw a Molotov cocktail-like bomb inside the bungalow owned by Boboy Ocampo.

Domowey said that in their initial investigation, witnesses who were drinking with Ocampo outside his house told them that they saw one of the two men approach the residence, light up a bottle and threw it into Ocampo’s house. He added that the two men immediately fled on foot as the fire spread to the 45 houses in the area that were made mostly of wood.

As of this writing, Domowey said that they were still determining the motive for the attack on Ocampo. He added that the assailants’ faces were somewhat familiar to the residents as they had seen them roaming their area days before Sunday’sfire.

The fire official said that two of his responders, FO1 Jun-jay Pharma and FO1 Lyndon Aguilar, suffered minor lacerations on their hands in the almost two-hour-long fire, which they had a hard time quelling because of the narrow streets. Meanwhile, five residents who either suffered minor cuts and had difficulty breathing were brought to San Juan Medical Center. They are Teresa Tongol, Jean Malong, Corazon Tolentino, Daniel dela Cruz and Oscar Tolentino. Officials estimated the cost of the damage to be at least P200,000.

Some 600 individuals affected by the fire are temporarily staying at the Sacred Heart Chapel and at the Christian Fellowship Center. The local government have provided them with meals, while the Philippine Red Cross has donated mats and blankets.  SFM