TACLOBAN CITY- A mother and her six children, to include a three-month old baby girl, were killed when their tent in Barangay Costa Brava, San Jose district, this city, was burned last May 28. The victims, identified as Maria Eliza Ocenar, 38 and children Kathlyn, 11; Justine, 10; Jovilyn, 5; Jasmine, 3 and three month old baby girl, survived during the onslaught of supertyphoon Yolanda last year. And the incident was so heartbreaking that even Fire Officer 1 Anthony Alvin Duran, officer-on-case, described it as “very shocking.” John Mark, 6, was the last to die while being treated at the Eastern Visayas Regional Medical Center due to the third-degree burn that he sustained. “It was a miracle that the boy survived. That’s the only thing I can say on what happened to him. When we arrived on the fire scene, the tent was already completely burned down. They must have been trapped inside,” Duran of the Tacloban City Fire Department said. “It was very shocking and heartbreaking. They survived Yolanda but only to die in a fire incident,” he added. It was learned that Ocenar’s husband, Reynante, a fisherman, was not in the tent as he was somewhere in Samar to earn a living. Duran said their initial investigation revealed that a lighted kerosene lamp used by the family while they were sleeping was the source of the fire. The fire started about 12:10 a.m. and lasted only for about 15 minutes. The tent owned by family was made of canvas material given by United Nations High Commissioner of Refugees (UNHCR) when the family was left homeless after Yolanda destroyed their house on November 8, 2013. There are 126 families or 508 persons living in tents in Costa Brava, considered to be one of the hardest-hit areas with 1,000 people dead and “hundreds” more missing. According to Duran, residents living in the area rushed into the scene and helped put the fire off. The residents conducted a “bucket brigade” using pails and other containers with water to put off the blaze that hit the tent of the victims. “It was so fast. When I was awaken by the fire reflecting into our house, I hurriedly went outside. The same with my neighbours. We hurried to get water; everyone is bringing a pale of water. Everyone was helping. But it was just so fast,” said Romeo Dela Torre, a neighbour. According to Dela Torre, the family was only using a kerosene lamp as a source of light just like the majority of the families living in the tent city. “I hope the government will look at our condition seriously. This thing should not happen again or should not have been happening at all,” Dela Torre said, adding he really wanted to have a permanent house the soonest possible time after staying in the tent for close to seven months already after Yolanda. “We heard an explosion. They were trapped inside. They were not able to open the zipper of the tent right away,” said Harlene Ocenar, a relative of the victims whose tent is just about five meters away from the burned tent. Raymund Solaya, 13, a friend of Justine, said he felt sorry for what happened to the family. “Justine was my playmate. He once told me he wanted to be a policeman someday. Now he is gone,” Raymund said, adding they were doing their best to stop the fire. Over 5,000 families in Tacloban have remained in tent houses and temporary shelters in the city. The regional disaster management council has said that 2, 678 perished in Tacloban alone during the storm. (RONALD O.REYES with ROEL T.AMAZONA)
