Q1 fire damages surpass P5 million, up from 2018

After Iloilo City Mayor Jose Espinosa III called on all city barangays to maintain proper fire brigades last month, the local Bureau of Fire Protection (BFP) found 67 out of the city’s total 180 barangays have organized a fire brigade.

“The barangay fire brigade is very important because it is the first line of defense [for] each barangay whenever there is fire incident,” explained BFP-Iloilo City operations chief, Senior Fire Officer 3 Aquilino Sampiano. “We are ready to [provide] them training to make [them] functional.”

The mayor earlier made a similar statement, emphasizing the importance of having a functioning barangay fire brigade.

“[Within] the first 10 to 15 minutes you can still stop the fire and this can be done with the help of your barangay fire brigade,” he said. “Fire brigades should be alert so, when someone calls for help, they can easily respond.”

Sampiano cited funding as one of the reasons why barangays say they have yet to organize fire brigades but he affirmed local communities should be capable.

“Organizing a fire brigade does not entail big cost,” he explained. “All you need is time and equipment.”

Meanwhile, the BFP-Iloilo City indicated, in the first quarter of 2019, from January to March, the city totaled over P5 million in fire damages. The figure is up from the P2 million reported during the same period last year.

There were also more incidents, increasing to 143 instances recorded this year from the 96 in 2018. Of the reported fire incidents, 49 were structural in nature and 41 were from grass fires. There were also 33 pole fire incidents, which refer to electrical poles catching on fire./WDJ