In Davao, 8 condos off-limits after quakes

NO ONE HOME Unit owners at Ecoland 4000 Residences in Davao have been issued notices to vacate as the city government declares the building unfit for occupancy due to extensive damage from the Oct. 31 earthquake. KARLOS MANLUPIG

DAVAO CITY—The Office of the City Building Official (Ocbo) here has ordered the owners and management of eight condominiums in the city to prepare measures to fix various damage sustained by the buildings during the series of earthquakes that jolted Mindanao last month.

Grace Catubig, Ocbo head, said the condominiums had been declared off-limits, after unit owners and occupants were given notices to vacate. She, however, declined to identify these condominiums.

Condemned

“I won’t mention names but there are eight establishments that were served notices. Three other commercial buildings were under evaluation but upon reinspection, we found out that the three were not that structurally damaged,” Catubig told the Inquirer.

She said, however, that the condominium Ecoland 4000 Residences, whose first floor collapsed during the 6.5-magnitude earthquake that hit Mindanao on Oct. 31, had already been condemned by the city government, making it unfit for occupancy.

CRUSHED At least two levels of the five-story Ecoland 4000 Residences in Davao City were crushed due to intense ground shaking when a 6.5-magnitude earthquake rocked several areas in Mindanao on Oct. 31. —KARLOS MANLUPIG

Among the buildings which were damaged by the quake, Palmetto Place Davao in Barangay Maa was declared off-limits because of the cracks found on the walls of its Buildings 2 and 3.

Catubig said her office advised the management to consult a structural engineer on how to deal with the damage.

Evaluation

Most of the condominiums declared off-limits to the public were six- to 24-stories high and were “50 to 60 percent occu pied,” she added.

The notices to vacate, she said, would give the buildings’ administrators and owners time to rehabilitate the structures.

“We required them to submit their mitigating measures based on the evaluations of their structural engineers, and based on what their structural engineers would recommend to correct the [damaged parts of their] buildings,” Catubig said. “We gave them five days to comply.”

Catubig said teams of engineers from Philippine Institute of Civil Engineers, Association of Structural Engineers of the Philippines and Structural Engineers Association of Davao had been helping them inspect the integrity of buildings in the city.

A series of strong earthquakes, at 6 magnitude or greater, rocked Cotabato province in October, leaving a trail of destruction in villages and urban centers, like Kidapawan City. Ground shaking was felt in other areas in Mindanao, including Davao.