SAN PEDRO CITY-Two children died while three others suffered second degree burns after a fire hit their house in Bacoor City in Cavite province on Thursday.
Senior Fire Officer 2 Emmanuel Arcallana of the city fire bureau said the fatalities, Anna Mae Chavez, 6, and her half brother Armando Punto, 4, along with their other siblings and cousins, were asleep when the fire caused by an unattended candle broke out around 1 a.m. in Barangay San Nicolas 1. It took firefighters over an hour to put out the flame.
Arcallana said the supposedly eldest in the household was the victims’ 45-year-old aunt, who was out when the fire started. Eight people were left in the house, the oldest being a 19-year-old cousin of the victims.
Arcallana said as the fire spread, some of the children were able to rush out of the house while three had to escape through the windows.
“It was only later when they learned that the two did not make it out,” he said.
Arcallana described the house as a three-storey concrete structure on a 20-square meter lot. The household had been using candles at night since they had not paid their electric bills for a year now, he said.
The victims’ parents were away when the incident happened and the children had long been left to their aunt’s care.