Some firefighters wept and prayed as they retrieved badly burned bodies from the gutted Bed and Breakfast Pension House in Cagayan’s provincial capital. Including 9 Nurses...
The dead included nine nurses. The rest of the fatalities were members of the Fondevilla family that owned the hotel and stayed in some of its rooms.
“Their families spent fortunes to send these children to school only to see them end that way,” fire investigator Daniel Abana said. “It’s so close to Christmas, we wept when we saw their bodies.”
Some managed to escape on their own but others may have panicked and got trapped by the flames. Many of the dead had crammed in bathrooms on the top two floors. One victim had a foot stuck out of a window in a desperate attempt to survive, Abana said.
The building was still smoldering when firefighters broke in and scrambled to search for the 15 victims, police said.
A nursing college instructor, Romeo Opido, told police that about 36 nursing students were at the hotel. At least 27 escaped and nine were missing, he said before the bodies were discovered.
Twelve nursing students were taken to hospitals with minor burns.
Most of the fatalities were from the University of La Salette in Santiago City, said Senior Insp. Neil Caranguian, city fire officer.
