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Fire burns down China Town house
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Posted on Jul 15 2004
A two-unit house near the Aging Office in China Town was destroyed by fire Wednesday afternoon.
Nobody was reported injured but the interior of the semi-concrete house was totally damaged, according to the police report. The report did not indicate who owns the house or the identity of the persons living there, except for a witness who said the house is occupied by a Filipino woman and a Chamorro man.
The report said that a neighbor, Catherine Nover Billy, had called 911 to report the fire incident, soon after noticing smoke rising from the roof of the burning building.
The report indicated that the police received the call about the fire around 3:28pm. DPS Fire personnel were already at the scene when the police arrived.
Billy told police that she had just come from work and was preparing to go to Gold’s Gym when she heard a crackling sound coming from the south of her house. She initially dismissed this, saying she thought her neighbors were creating the cracking sound. When the noise persisted, she looked in the direction where the fire was coming from and saw a small amount of smoke rising from the roof.
When the crackling sound and the smoke continued to get bigger, she said she became worried that the neighbor’s house might be on fire and called 911, telling the operator that she does not know if her neighbors were home.
Another witness, Dominic Calderon Jacob, told police that his neighbor’s house was already on fire when he arrived home. “He said he does not know the family name of that residence but he knows that a Filipina lives there along with a Chamorro male,” the report stated.
After the fire was under control, the fire personnel found no one inside the house. (Cassie DLG Fejeran)
