CITY OF CALAPAN, Philippines–Two offices in the provincial capitol complex, including the provincial tourism office, were razed in a fire late Friday evening.
Fireman Officer 1 Jansen Badillo of the Bureau of Fire Protection in this city, in a phone interview early Saturday morning, said the fire started at 11:25 p.m. but was put out an hour later.
He said power supply to the offices was immediately cut off when they learned of the fire.
Badillo said an adjacent office, the Provincial Employment and Services Office was also totally burned while the provincial legal office was partially burned.
He said electrical short circuit from Christmas displays in the offices could have caused the fire.
There were no casualties.
During the holiday season offices at the capitol complex have been decorated with Christmas lights in a competition with the theme “Christmas in Wonderland.”
The provincial government gave each local government office a subsidy of P25,000 and each national government office P5,000 to join the tilt.
The Public Safety Department and volunteers from the Chinese Chamber of Commerce in the city helped put out the fire.