MANILA, Philippines - A 4-hour fire gutted the homes of an estimated 2,000 families in a residential area in Paco district in Manila.

The Bureau of Fire Protection officials in Manila raised general alarm on the blaze at Canonigo street corner Gomez street in Paco. This meant that all available firefighters in Metro Manila were called upon to assist in putting out the fire.

Firefighters said they were hampered by the narrow alleys in the area.

The blaze spread to 2 barangays of Manila due to the strong winds and the many houses built from light materials.

A statement of the Philippine National Red Cross (PNRC), meanwhile, said that 1 person suffered from suffocation during the blaze.

The PNRC said Joseph Carlogermo was brought by its Emergency Response Unit team to the Ospital ng Maynila and admitted him at the emergency room.

A PNRC medic also treated 74-year-old Leonardo Aquino who reportedly experienced dizziness.
The cause of the blaze has yet to be determined.

Officials, meanwhile, have yet to determine an evacuation center for the affected residents.

Residents displaced by the blaze were seen placing on the streets and on a nearby playground whatever belongings they have managed to save from the blaze. With a report from Jenny Reyes, ABS-CBN News

Reference: http://www.abs-cbnnews.com/nation/metro-manila/01/13/10/fire-hits-residential-area-paco




This is the estimated affected area of Paco Fire last January 13, 2010.

The January 12, 2010, Haiti earthquake occurred in the boundary region separating the Caribbean plate and the North America plate. This plate boundary is dominated by left-lateral strike slip motion and compression, and accommodates about 20 mm/y slip, with the Caribbean plate moving eastward with respect to the North America plate.

Haiti occupies the western part of the island of Hispaniola, one of the Greater Antilles islands, situated between Puerto Rico and Cuba. At the longitude of the January 12 earthquake, motion between the Caribbean and North American plates is partitioned between two major east-west trending, strike-slip fault systems -- the Septentrional fault system in northern Haiti and the Enriquillo-Plantain Garden fault system in southern Haiti.

The location and focal mechanism of the earthquake are consistent with the event having occurred as left-lateral strike slip faulting on the Enriquillo-Plantain Garden fault system. This fault system accommodates about 7 mm/y, nearly half the overall motion between the Caribbean plate and North America plate.

The Enriquillo-Plantain Garden fault system has not produced a major earthquake in recent decades. The EPGFZ is the likely source of historical large earthquakes in 1860, 1770, 1761, 1751, 1684, 1673, and 1618, though none of these has been confirmed in the field as associated with this fault.