Fire hits 2 Isabela stores

ILAGAN, Isabela, Philippines – A fire that lasted for four and a half hours gutted a hardware store and the appliance depot of a department store in this capital town early yesterday morning, a week after the tragic hotel fire in Tuguegarao City, Cagayan.

Razed were the hardware and general merchandise store of former Ilagan mayor Mercedes Uy, and the Arora general merchandise store of Indian national Jimmy Arora.

It took firefighters until 6:30 a.m. to put the fire in Barangay Calamagui 2 under control. No one was injured in the blaze.

Uy said close to P10 million worth of stocks went up in smoke in her hardware store, mostly galvanized iron sheets that have been in demand since the onslaught of super typhoon “Juan.”

Uy said they were supposed to conduct today an inventory of stocks in the hardware store, which was unmanned and locked since noon of Christmas Eve.

Arora, for his part, refused to give any statement.

A concrete firewall prevented the fire from spreading to adjacent establishments.

The fire was the second to hit a store of Uy. In 1990, her store’s main branch in the town proper was among establishments and houses razed to the ground in a blaze, where an old bedridden woman died.

A week ago, 16 people, including 10 Isabela nursing graduates, died in a fire in a pension house in Tuguegarao.