Mayor lauds honest Valenzuela firemen

Valenzuela City Mayor Sherwin Gatchalian yesterday lauded the city’s firefighters for returning P.5 million in cash and two safety deposit boxes containing an undetermined amount of cash and important documents to the rightful owners of a razed factory.

Chief Inspector Agapito Nacario, Valenzuela City fire marshal, and the operatives of the fire intelligence and investigation unit, led by Inspector Enrico Caco, found the money and the steel vaults intact in a clearing operation after the fire was declared out at 9:30 p.m. last Thursday.

The items were immediately relayed to the factory owners for appropriate accounting and turnover. The owners, in turn, expressed their gratitude for the firemen’s honesty.

This show of honesty has apparently become a habit for Nacario.

Sometime last year, Nacario, then fire marshal for Caloocan City, was cited by City Mayor Enrico Echiverri for returning cash in the same amount to owners of a factory that burned down in the city.

Last Thursday, fire hit the factory of Lins Magiclean Corp., makers of detergent products, at the Sacred Heart Compound on San Diego street in Barangay Canumay West, Valenzuela at around 4:45 p.m.

Firefighters said the arrival of volunteer fire brigades prevented the fire from spreading to adjacent structures.

Nacario reported that at the height of the fire, Emelyn Basilan, accounting supervisor, rushed to the door from the mezzanine floor in panic and jumped to the ground floor resulting in injuries and contusions.

She was taken to the nearest hospital for treatment. No other persons were reported injured.

As the firemen were conducting clearing operations, another fire broke out at the annex of the Karuhatan Industrial Corp. on Calle Onse, Gen. T. de Leon, also in Valenzuela at about 5:20 p.m. The fire was put under control in a little over an hour.

Damage was placed at P15 million in the first fire incident and P10 million in the other, Nacario said.