1 killed in QC fire as man sets room on fire just to spite wife

Firemen shoot water into the upper floors of Gateway 2000 Development Corp., a building on Araneta Avenue, Quezon City, which caught fire shortly around midnight Saturday. At 4 p.m. yesterday, smoke was still rising from the structure full of highly combustible materials. Lyn Rillon

MANILA, Philippines—A blaze started by a man who wanted to spite his wife left another man dead in Quezon City on the first day of Fire Prevention Month.

At press time, a second blaze that started around Saturday midnight had yet to be put out Sunday afternoon, keeping firefighters busy in the Araneta Avenue area.

In Barangay San Roque, a two-hour fire left a resident dead and displaced 26 families at an informal settlers community on Camarilla Street, near the Murphy area in Cubao.

The blaze which started at 3:40 a.m. Sunday in the house of Soledad Fajardo spread to the neighboring 12 shanties, including the one owned by the lone fatality, 50-year-old Rolando Salvador.

Quezon City fire marshal Supt. Jesus Fernandez, quoting Salvador’s family members, said that he had been drinking the previous night and was believed to be sound asleep when the flames spread to their house.

Salvador’s family members said that they only realized that he must have failed to wake up and get out of the house when the blaze was put out at 5:12 a.m. and they could not locate him.

Fernandez told the Inquirer that the fire was set deliberately based on the confession of Agripino Fajardo, 34, from whose house the flames started.  Fajardo is the victim’s next door neighbor.

According to Fernandez, a family member overheard Fajardo and his wife arguing inside their room shortly before the blaze broke out.

Investigators immediately looked for Fajardo who, after he was taken into custody, admitted that he had started the fire  to spite his wife, Fernandez said.

Probers added that they have yet to determine what the couple had been fighting about.

Fernandez estimated the cost of damage to property at around P100,000.

A complaint of arson will be filed against Fajardo in the Quezon City Prosecutor’s Office today, he added.

At 11 a.m. Sunday fire fighters said they had the flames under control although smoke was still rising from the heavily-charred seven-story Gateway 2000 Development Corp. building on Araneta Avenue, Barangay Tatalon, Quezon City in the afternoon.

Fire fighters said they could not enter the building as the temperature inside was still too high, Fernandez said.

The building housed several offices including a mannequin factory on the second floor  where the fire began. Fernandez said that the flames were difficult to put out as the building was “full of highly combustible materials” such as paint, tarpaulin sheets, clothing and styrofoam, among others.