Fire razes school building

DUMAGUETE CITY, Philippines – A 30-minute fire of still unknown cause razed a 9-classroom school building of the Mabinay Municipal High School in Mabinay, Negros Oriental early Tuesday.

No one was reported injured in the fire, said investigators who pegged the damage at between P6 million and P7 million.

According to SFO4 Seferino Otod, of the Provincial Fire Marshall’s Office, an initial report showed that at around 1 a.m. Tuesday, a certain Jesus Cadiente called the Mabinay Fire Station to inform that a fire broke out at the school situated in the town’s center village.

Two fire trucks were dispatched immediately to the scene and responding firefighters found the building already halfway engulfed by flames, said Otod, adding that the blaze started in one of the computer rooms in the center of the building.

Two other fire trucks from the adjacent Kabankalan City in Negros Occidental also responded and helped put out the fire, which firefighters eventually declared a fire out 30 minutes after.

The decade-old burnt building, owned by the DepEd, housed the library, principal’s office, computer rooms and classrooms, and that several computers and other equipment have been destroyed.

The cause of the investigation is still being determined, even as it appeared that the fire may be linked to the old electrical system of the building.  - THE FREEMAN