George St. fire leaves 16 homeless
A dramatic weekend fire in a highly congested area of Belize City has destroyed two houses and left sixteen people homeless. News 5’s Rick Romero rushed to the scene on Sunday to find fire-fighters fighting the flames from various angles in an effort to prevent it from spreading. Today, fire officials tell News 5’s Jacqueline Woods the whole thing could have easily been prevented.
Jacqueline Woods, Reporting
A crowd of spectators gathered on Basra Street as smoke billowed from two adjacent houses at number 101 George Street. Given the congestion of the area, residents watched carefully, realising that the fire could have spread quickly through the neighbourhood. Within minutes, the blaze completely destroyed a two bedroom wooden house and partially burnt the back wall of a two storey wooden house that also suffered extensive water damage.
By the time the first fire truck arrived on the scene, the smaller house occupied by Marlon Vernon and his family was already engulfed in flames. There was nothing fire-fighters could do to save the building, but worked quickly to prevent it from spreading to other houses. However, attacking the fire did present some challenges of its own. Fire officials, with the assistance of volunteers from the street, fought the flames from the rooftops because they had no ground access to the blaze.
Henry Baizar, Fire Chief
“It did create some difficulties for us. It’s not really how the house was situated, it’s there’s lots of very high fences in each of these areas, and the area is very congested. On arrival at the scene of the fire, the first house was already gutted in flames and the second was already on fire. So what we concentrated on was to try to out that one that was just started and try to ensure that no other houses were able to go up in flames. And that’s exactly what we did.”
According to Fire Chief Henry Baizar, it was not until they were already en route to the scene, that someone called to say there was a fire. Baizar says they found out about the incident from an employee who lives in the area and had just gotten home when he saw the smoke…but by then, it was too late.
The fire left sixteen homeless and destroyed many household items. Those possessions that were not lost in the flames, received a lot of water damage. Leonarda Chan who occupied one of the four apartments in the two-storey building, says she was not aware that there was fire next door and says no one even bothered to warn them.
Leonarda Chan, Fire Victim
“I was inside cleaning my house, mopping and getting prepared to go to work.”
Jacqueline Woods
“And then what, you noticed smoke coming from next door?”
Leonarda Chan
“N, I didn’t even know, no one said anything to us. All I saw was a young lady walking outside, up and down with a dog in her hand. She didn’t say anything to us, she didn’t say that the house was on fire or burning down. All she did was walk up and down and didn’t even try tell me to evacuate the house because our house is on fire. When I came out, I heard a young man say to somebody that he needed water. I asked water for what. He said for the fire. I said fire, where is the fire? And he said it’s behind there. I looked back and I saw the fire behind my house.”
Today, Chan returned to her apartment to try to salvage whatever she could, but discovered that someone had already done the job for her.
Leonarda Chan
“They break in a steal the things. They broke in the house and steal what we have left. They stole my beauty stuff, our shoes and clothes and other house items from inside the house.”
Once the smoke had cleared, fire-fighters started the work of trying to determine what caused the blaze. Baizar says initial investigations reveal the fire could have been prevented.
Henry Baizar, Fire Chief
“The house had been wired for a considerable length of time, and the occupants of the house just bought some new appliances, which required much more energy for their use. All that was in the fuse box inside the house, was two fifteen-amp fuse. That’s all that was there, and that had to take care of all the appliances in the home, and where the new refrigerator was plugged in, it got overheated and burned through the wall. What happened there, was there was a rolled up mattress that was set against the wall and that’s what ignited and started the fire.”
This incident occurred at a time when fire-fighters are undergoing an intensive training in fire investigation.
Henry Baizar
“This fire helped us considerably. Yesterday we could have gotten there with the instructors and actually dig through the rubble and eventually come up to where the fire started, the origin and the cause of the fire.
Determining the cause of the fire will help the fire service and Belize in general to ensure that proper electrical codes are being effected and put into place. When you go to these fires and determine the cause, then you can put those things in place.”
But while the fire helped in training, Baizar says families must practice safe housekeeping. That is, to ensure that when moving into a building or connecting new appliances, an electrician should check the wiring so that an overload in the electrical system can be avoided. Reporting for News 5, Jacqueline Woods.
Following this incident, three persons had to receive medical attention. Baizar says the Vernon family received treatment for minor burns to their face, hands and legs. Meanwhile, a street volunteer identified as “Billy Jean” received a cut to his hand. He was treated by the Belize Emergency Response Team and released. According to fire officials, only the two storey wooden building was insured for twenty thousand dollars.
