By ALEXANDRIA SAN JUAN
The house of veteran OPM artist Freddie Aguilar in Quezon City was razed by a fire late Tuesday night, turning his recordings, awards, and some musical instruments into ashes.
Fire Inspector Rosendo Cabillan of QC Bureau of Fire Protection said fire struck Aguilar’s resident on Avery Street in a subdivision in Barangay North Fairview at around 11:04 p.m.
Cabillan said the fire started on the ceiling of the singer-songwriter’s music room on the ground floor at 11:15 p.m.
In a radio interview, Aguilar’s son, Jeriko, said that he was inside the music room when he noticed a toasting sound and saw that the ceiling was already on fire.
He warned his father’s wife, Jovie, who was then at the second floor of their two-story house with her mother, about the fire.
The two both failed to reach the ground floor due to thick smoke billowing the area and instead went to their balcony where they climbed up the roof, crossed to their neighbor’s roof, and fled their burning house unhurt.
The fire that lasted 30 minutes destroyed around 70 percent of the veteran musician’s house before it was declared out at about 11:38 p.m.
BFP Fire Marshal Manuel Manuel said that no one was reported injured, but the estimated damage was pegged at P1.5 million.
Manuel said that fire probers have yet to determine the cause of the fire as investigation was still onongoing as of press time.
“The fruits of my labor, my records, CDs, bestseller albums, they were all burned down, but its okay, at least there is no life lost,” said Aguilar who was at a bar in Tomas Morato when the incident happened.
Among the things burned were Aguilar’s personal belongings including his recordings, awards, and musical instruments.
