A FIESTA celebration turned into a disaster for residents of sitio Bugnay, barangay Labangon in Cebu City after a fire broke out in the area before 3 p.m yesterday.
The Cebu City Fire Department together with the Emergency Rescue Unit Foundation (ERUF) and the Filipino-Chinese Brigade put out the fire in 20 minutes.
But the blaze managed to raze down 26 houses made mostly of light materials.
Supt. Anderson Comar, Cebu City Fire Marshall, placed the damages at P200,000. Despite the narrow road and the presence of curious passersby, they managed to put out the fire, he said.
Comar said the residents helped the firefighters in putting out the blaze, while some of them aided neighbors in recovering their belongings from their shanties.
Investigators are still trying to find out the cause of the fire.
Comar said some residents told him about a short-circuit in the wiring of the barangay’s sound system used in the festivity.
Aside from a 50-year-old man who was rushed to the hospital by the Basak Pardo Emergency Rescue Team to the Cebu City Medical Center for burns sustained in both hands, no one else was injured.
Labangon barangay Captain Victor Buendia opened the old barangay hall as temporary shelter for the families displaced by the fire.